Cover Crop Benefits Clearer in Drought and Wet Years

Joe Breker needs his own tee shirt that reads “No Tillage, More Plants” or “Cover Crops Are Good Risk Management.” The North Dakota farmer thinks the tandem of no-till farming and the use of cover crops are key to making farmers more resilient in good times and bad, deluge or drought.

That’s because National Corn Growers Association’s 2017 Good Steward Recognition Recipient has spent four decades working to make his farm more sustainable and he has seen the conservation and business benefits of protecting and enriching the soil with cover crops, especially when mother nature provides too little or too much rain.

“If you already have established cover crops in a wet spring as we’ve had, it protects the soil from erosion and in some cases can get you in the field faster. That’s important when getting planting done is a challenge,” Breker said. “Sure, some fields are just too wet but cover crops generally improve your chances for success in most years.”

Cover crop in corn

And Breker is not alone. A new report Cover Crop Economics from USDA’s Sustainable Agriculture Research & Education says farmers around the country are planting cover crops on millions of acres. He says that’s because cover crops lead to healthier, more productive soil, adds biomass, sequesters greenhouse gases like carbon and improves nutrient cycling.

The report is timely, as the latest Census of Agriculture revealed that national cover crop acreage increased by 50 percent from 2012 to 2017. It’s also timely due to the interest in cover crops for planting on fields that were flooded or otherwise unplanted (prevent plant situations) this spring, in order to suppress weeds while protecting and improving the soil.