What Is the Ideal Planting Window To Establish Cover Crops and Obtain Optimum Crop Growth and Yield of Rotational Crops?
Understanding the Importance of Cover Crop Planting Dates in Illinois Row Crop Production
This project is comparing 1) different cereal rye seeding dates and rates before soybean, and 2) different planting dates of two clover species after soybean harvest and ahead of corn. Farmers will gain better insights into cover crop planting and seeding rate recommendations and best management practices for adding cover crops to their cropping systems.
WHY THIS RESEARCH IS IMPORTANT
- Cover crops are an important tool in preserving and increasing soil productivity, stewarding water resources, suppressing weeds and retaining nutrients. However, planting cover crops coincides with the busy harvest season. Also, research to influence best practices for successful cover crops has been limited across the vast Illinois growing environments.
- The trials will assess optimal planting windows, seeding rates and termination timing. Understanding these variables will influence how to maximize overwintering, biomass production, and rotational crop stand, growth and yield.
HOW THIS RESEARCH BENEFITS THE FARMER
- Results of this trial are designed to give farmers more cover crop options in their management toolbox. Researchers will be able to provide best management guidance on a regionalized basis to account for the variability across the state, as well as the impact of the unique weather conditions each season.
- Farmers will be equipped with better insights on planting dates and seeding rates, which cover crop species fit best within soybean-corn rotations, and optimum termination timing to maximize biomass production and new crop stand establishment.
RESEARCH TEAM
- Nathan Johanning, Extension Educator, Commercial Agriculture, University of Illinois Extension
- Dr. Talon Becker, Extension Educator, Commercial Agriculture, UIUC
- Luke Merritt, Research Specialist, UIUC
- Dr. Giovani Preza Fontes, Assistant Professor & Field Crops Extension Agronomist, UIUC
- Greg Steckel, Research Agronomist, UIUC
TRIAL LOCATIONS
- Crop Sciences Research & Education Center, Urbana
- Northwest Illinois Agriculture Research & Demonstration Center, Monmouth
- Orr Agricultural Research and Demonstration Center, Baylis
- Belleville Research Center, Belleville
- Ewing Demonstration Center, Ewing
About the Lead Researchers
Nathan Johanning
Extension Educator, Commercial Agriculture
University of Illinois Extension
618-939-3434
njohann@illinois.edu
ARE YOU A FARMER OR ADVISOR?
If you’re a farmer or advisor, we invite you to take our Soybean Production Concerns Survey linked below to help guide future ISA research efforts. We also encourage you to contact us below with specific production challenge research ideas.
ARE YOU A RESEARCHER?
If you’re a researcher interested in working with ISA on a project, we encourage you to contact us with your ideas. The RFP will open in early March. Contact us below to be added to the mailing list for more information.
