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Russellville, KY | I was born in 1983, so I have a different frame of reference. We raised tobacco, always cover cropped it due to our conservation plan. We have always had cattle, so the cover crop served a dual purpose of erosion control and high quality forage. When I was in college, I traveled all over the southeastern US with the Agronomy Club, Soil Judging Team, Dairy Club, the fraternity, FFA Alumni Association, as well as my part-time job, and I never heard anyone who was practicing cover cropping complain about them.
Fast forward to when I came home- I had cattle in 2007, and watched all of our "free & cheap" hay land disappear to row cropping. I'm not talking big tracts of ground, I am talking about 3 acres here, 5 acres there, 15 acres somewhere else. I was at a crux in my operation, keep losing ground and keep losing money with cattle, or get into row cropping. My ground is mostly B slope (2-6% grade) and is a silt loam soil that is classified as moderately well-drained. In 2011, I planted my first soybean crop and followed behind it with annual ryegrass. Luckily (in retrospect), it got past me and we cut it for hay just to get the field cleaned off. That 50 acres made enough hay to feed my 50 cows through the next winter, so I was hooked.
I have missed 1 year out of 6 getting a cover crop planted, and it showed drastically. Seeing the gullies form in a single winter was enough to convince me that I needed to make absolute sure that every acre was covered. | |
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cover crops
