Managing for Profit

Use and benefits of cover crops on the rise

The Conservation Technology Information Center (CTIC) has sent out surveys to farmers the last three years to look into the use of cover crops. Program Director Chad Watts says CTIC partners with the Sustainable Ag Research and Education Agency, USDA and for the first time this year the American Seed Trade Association. He tells Brownfield the number of respondents has risen each year and the number of benefits has grown too.

“It seems like in some of the first surveys we saw more basic kinds of benefits.  Things like planting cover crops to hold the soil in place.  And now we’re beginning to see a much more complex set of benefits: everything from building soil health to protecting nutrients from leaching.”

The survey asked farmers which types of cover crops they were using.

“Cereal rye, annual rye grass and oil seed radishes are by far the most popular.”  He says seed mixes are becoming more common too.  Watts also sees value-added opportunities for farmers who raise livestock.

“Introducing livestock onto those cover crops for a short-term basis during certain times of the year.  That’s another added benefit that farmers see from their ability to plant cover crops if they’ve got livestock.  They’ve got an additional feed option that gives them variety and an opportunity to sort of spread the manure, if you will, out across the land.”  The survey showed that more producers who have livestock are using cover crops.

Commodity prices have been on a downward trajectory since the first survey three years ago and Watts asked farmers how that might impact how they look at cover crops.

“We might expect that with diminishing margins that conservation is one of the first things to go.  We’re seeing that people are realizing the long-term benefits of cover crops in these soil health-building systems.”

He also said that the last two surveys show only 40 percent of producers who use cover crops take advantage of any type of cost-sharing program.