Very interesting, Joel. Thank you for the feedback. There certainly are a lot of challenges to trying to raise corn in an organic system but sounds like you are making good progress.  I would like to hear about the nitrogen study results across those strips.

I know you are focused on organic. However the idea of stripping into clover in the spring like that, planting corn right after stripping and then followed by a post spray may be a system that would have some real economic and soil improvement benefits for conventional growers.

Seems like there is a lot of corn planted into strips made in clover cover crops in a wheat/corn/bean rotation in Ontario. They are finding fall made Pluribus strips into the clover, mostly to clear the clover and make a black strip followed by another spring Pluribus strip pass down the same path with fertilizer just ahead of the planter works very well. The spring pass gets the regrowth out of the way and lets the grower band some fertilizer for the advantages of banding placement.

It is a pleasure working with you and learning as you move through your research program.

Jim

add: Joel, as you know, cover crops are not a very common sight in C ILL with its heavy black soils. Demonstrating how cover crops can be a help in conventional system would be another benefit of your research. Thank you.