Plans to further evaluate interseeder impact on yields, N contribution, soil quality, herbicide response, and more continue with summer/fall field days to follow.
Figure 1: Successful interseeded cover crops from last year as they appear now before planting this year.
We are continuing our work interseeding and will have an expanded research and demonstration program again this year as part of our NRCS-CIG project. One goal this year is to gain more understanding of the impacts on yields, N contributions and soil quality of interseeded cover crops when corn is planted back into these fields.
Last week we began sampling some of our fields that had successful interseedings last year. The differences in our Landisville study between the interseeded treatments and the control were dramatic. Our clover stand was not exceptionally dense last summer, which reinforced the concept that these interseeded cover crops can fill in well with adequate fertility and growing conditions. I would be surprised if we didn’t see some impact from the clover on this year’s corn on corn yields.
A second goal will be to accumulate more data on the impacts of interseeding on corn yields during the year of establishment. Generally yield impacts in our work and those in the literature have been minimal. We recently developed an online fact sheet that summarizes some of the literature and data on this issue.
Another goal will be to continue to refine our herbicide response data with different species of cover crops. Last year we found a number of options that seem to have promise
We will also be looking at different cover crop species and varieties. Last year we collected data on establishment of 10 ryegrass cultivars, and 9 different species at multiple locations.
We will also be collaborating with several conservation districts around the state to establish some demonstration plots for summer or fall field days. We will announce these in the Field Crop News.
Source : psu.edu