Cover Crop Realities

Warren Schneckenburger

Morrisburg ON

@farmerschneck

Where it all began?

• Fall of 2010

• Continuous corn

• 30% soybeans

• Some wheat

Paradigm Shift

• 2011 National No-Tillage Conference

• My eyes were opened

• The plows were parked

A long row to hoe

• Started with aiming to cut tillage on soybean acres

• Reducing corn on corn acres

• Aiming for better soil structure

• Quasi controlled traffic

Reduced Tillage

• Disk Ripping was the answer

• 2 tillage passes corn on corn

• Look how smooth the field is!

• It was great, but still not a green field

Enter Cover Crops

• Where do the corn stalks go?

• NNTC taught me goal orientation

• I want soil cover in August and to plant 2 days earlier

• Focus on soybeans

• We had the no-til equipment

How we made it work

• Cereal rye was our seed of choice

• Great for northern climates

• Easy to terminate

• Easy to establish

Interseeding

• To the drawing board

• Had to manufacture the equipment

• Cereal rye is not shade tolerant

• A gap in the farms work load

Mistakes

• Finding the right population

• Selecting the right corn hybrids

• Rain is key

• Tendering the high seeding rate

Scaling up

• Seed is expensive

• Volumes are High

• Grow your own to cut costs

Scaling up

• Rain is critical so efficiency is key

• If no rain in the forecast your strategy needs to change

• Consider post harvest.

More acres more better

• Don’t focus your efforts onto one single task.

• Interseeding is best but drilling is cheaper and easier

• More acres is better than focusing on interseeding

When is too late?

• We’ve gone as late as Dec 10th

• Broadcast is fast and cheap but seed rates are high

• Ideally earlier is better but you can still get benefit late

Termination

• A lot of options

• Corn ASAP!!!

• Soybeans is a grey…or green area

• #plantgreen

• I like to kill either the day of or a couple days after drilling beans

I prefer to drill green

• Wet rye cuts easily and doesn’t hair pin

• A rain delay won’t ruin your day

• Makes picking stones harder!

• No Dust equals no soil lost!

Challenges

• Frost 2014 the leaves stayed up

• You have to pick varieties that are shorter

• Corn head maintenance is key to process the stalks

• Residue management out the back key

• Rain is the most important

Grab a shovel

• Start walking

• Above ground is only part of the story

• Roots and worm activity

• Arbuscular Mycorrhizal fungi networks

The Future

• Making it work on corn

• Reducing tillage further

• Banding all fertilizer

• Precision cover crops

Remember that photo?

• #happyfarmer

• Finally into pilot scale

• Strip tillage is our future

• A lot of possibilities

Thankyou for your time

Questions?

@farmerschneck