The document discusses the use of cover crops in row crop systems in northern Illinois, highlighting their benefits in reducing nitrate leaching and improving soil health. It includes examples of farmers' experiences, innovative practices for planting cover crops, and considerations for effectively managing them. The emphasis is on the adaptability of farmers and the importance of proper management to maximize the advantages of cover cropping.

1. Cover crops for row crop
systems in Northern IL
Dr. Joel Gruver
WIU – Agriculture
j-gruver@wiu.edu

3. Corn production on land classified as HEL by NRCS
Acres per county
200 - 12,000
12,000 – 37,000
37,000 - 62,000
> 62,000
https://www.agronomy.org/publications/aj/articles/96/1/1

4. Erosion is a serious issue in some
parts of northern IL
County < 1 *T 1-2*T > 2*T
Boone 91 6 2
Bureau 99 1 0
Caroll 84 12 4
DeKalb 94 6 0
Henry 83 10 6
JoDavies 83 12 5
Kendall 97 2 0
LaSalle 97 3 0
Lee 97 2 0
McHenry 93 6 1
Ogle 88 11 1
Stephenson 87 11 3
Winnebago 93 6 1

5. http://www.swcs.org/documents/filelibrary/BeyondTreport.pdf

6. 5-10% OM
45-50% highly resistant to decomposition
30-35% slowly decomposable
About 15% rapidly decomposable

7. 2-5% OM
> 75% highly resistant to decomposition
<20% slowly decomposable
<5 % rapidly decomposable

8. Prairie soil Farm field

9. Have you observed the impact of management on your farm?

11. Yield per unit of N has increased over the last 30 years
?
lbs of grain per lb of N
Some IL farmers consistently harvest more than
75 lbs of grain (1.3 bu) for each lb of N applied

12. So why does
nutrient
pollution from
agriculture
continue to be
such a serious
problem
in IL?

13. Has your farm ever
looked like this in the last
3 years?

14. Or this?
Dissipate large amounts of ag
chemicals into the environment…
sometimes the consequences are
severe !
http://mckusicklake.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/04/2007_0327image0001.JPG

15. Could this story be about your farm?
Increasing yield by installing drainage
By Mindy Ward, Missouri Farmer Today
BOONVILLE --- For more than 100 years, the
Hoff family has fought to farm wet areas of their
fields.
For Eddie Hoff, the fourth generation to farm the
creek bottom ground in Cooper County, the loss
of yield and added expense of working the
ground was ultimately affecting his bottom line.
“We were losing 60 to 70 bushels per acre in
some spots,” he says.
We were working the ground over and over. I
just wanted to no-till and save some cost.”
So, he decided to drain the soils with pattern tile.

16. Yield maps
have made
drainage
problems
more
obvious

18. Northern IL
contains a
lot of soils
that are
prone to
nitrate
leaching

19. Peak uptake > 10 lbs of
N/ac/day for high yield corn

20. Drainage practices should be combined
with practices that reduce leaching
REDUCTION POTENTIAL
combine summer annuals with winter annuals

22. Cover crops
Less loss
Less loss

23. The science is clear - cover crops can reduce nitrate
leaching at lower cost than most other practices!
Bare fallow
Kaspar et al. J. Environ. Qual. 36:1503-1511

24. What is innovation??
$ VS
This type of
innovation must be Home grown innovation
used on millions of that fits your acres
acres to pay for R&D

25. Are you an early adopter?
adopt ≠ adapt
Are you a master adapter?
Farmers that make cover crops work
tend to be master adapters!

26. Have you
attended a
cover crop
field day?
If not, make
plans to
attend one
in 2012

27. If you can’t make it to a field day,
learn about cover crop innovation
through participating in on-line
discussions
How many of you are “Ag Talkers”?

28. Cover crops are
not idiot-proof!
Using cover crops to capture multiple benefits
requires more management
There are few profits in idiot-proof systems

29. Traditional cover cropping in the Midwest
The
most tried and true
cover cropping system
in the Midwest region
Frost seeded red
clover

30. A lot more cover crops would get planted if we all had a several
month window of opportunity following small grain harvest

31. Corn and soybeans now cover > 90% of some IL counties
corn
soy

32. Spreading cover crop seed with fertilizer

33. Seeding cover
crops with liquid
manure

34. Seeding cover crops with a vertical tillage tool

35. The CC planting methods shown on the
previous slides are only feasible for a limited #
of acres after harvest in the Corn Belt
Other options are clearly needed!
Student: Which cover crops have you tried? how many acres?
following/preceding which crops?
Joe Nester replied:
We just inter-seeded 14,000 acres of corn and soybeans with annual
ryegrass. We used a helicopter service out of Minnesota to seed it. We
used annual ryegrass a year ago, seeding with drills after wheat and
soybeans, but the planting date was too late to wait after beans. Excellent
where seeded after wheat about Sept. 1. Our experience is limited, but
the idea is really taking off, to hold the soil in place over the winter, keep
nutrients within the field, and help with timely no-till planting in the
spring.

36. Photo from Joe Nester

37. Farmers have been using aerial seeding
to improve post-harvest grazing for a
long time

38. Cliff Schuette’s farm in S IL
Barkant Turnips-3 lbs
Rye 2 Bu
Airplane $8/Acre
Corn 183 Bu/acre
Atrazine 1 lb
Partner April 28

39. Forage brassicas have good cover crop potential
http://www.jennifermackenzie.co.uk/2005/12/bra
ssicas.html
Hunter

40. Set-up for efficient aerial seeding in SE IA
Steve Nebel

41. Steve
Nebel

42. Steve Nebel

43. IA and IL Aerial Applicator Survey (May-June 2010)
Name Location Experience w/CC Cost
no exp., no customer
Cady Aerial Spray Rock Falls, IL interest $8.00/a norm app $8.50/a cc
Benoit Aerial
Spraying Kankakee, IL turnips and rye $8.00/a norm app $10.00/a cc
Franks Flying
Service Morrison, IL ryegrass and c. rye $8.00/a norm app $10.00/a cc
Reeds Fly-on yes, c. rye, small part
Farming Mattoon, IL of business $8.00/a norm app $12.00/a cc
Killiam Flying rye, wheat on beans, $8.00/a norm app $10.00/ac
Service Carlinville, IL rye on corn or 10/lb
Curless Flying
Service Astoria, IL ryegrass and turnips $8-15.00/a all app.
Klein Flying St. Francisville, ~$12.50/a cc,
Service IL annual rye and turnips $9.00/a liquid app
Agriflite Services Wakarusa, IN rye, wheat, ryegrass ave $15.00/a for cc app.
Al's Aerial $10-15.00/a cc
Spraying Ovid, MI rye and wheat $10.00/a liquid

44. Don Birky’s
seeder in
Central IL

45. Don and Matt Birky’s unique
highboy with 10 feet and six
inches of clearance could attract
a crowd for its high-rising
maneuvers, but the father-son
team created the special
equipment for a tough job.
The highboy, dubbed High Roller,
was developed to air seed
legumes and other cover crops
into standing corn in August. The
Birkys, who operate On Track
Farming Inc. in rural Gibson City,
put the highboy through its paces
last week.

46. “I have been building
a seeder to overseed
cover crops into corn
& beans. I'm using a
Hagie STS 12 with a
Gandy Orbit Air seed
box. I can cover 90
feet / 36 rows and the
hopper holds 65 bu. “
Andy Ambriole’s
Highboy air
seeder

47. “This is the last and greenest field I did. Still has a little time to go yet, but
it should make some corn. Most other fields are brown with grain
moisture, I'm guessing, in the low 20's. The ground is getting more light,
so we'll see if that makes a difference.”

48. “It's kinda hard to tell the seed from the corn pollen. The
big lighter pieces are pollen. The smaller darker ones are
ryegrass and the little orange balls are crimson clover. The
seed mix was 80/20 ryegrass/clover”

50. Rig for mid-summer over-seeding into corn in Ontario

51. New bulletin from Penn State
Red clover can be frost seeded into small
grains in early spring, over seeded into corn
in early-summer and over seeded into
soybeans just before leaf drop.

52. Planting while harvesting

54. Dwayne Beck’s set-up
for planting while
harvesting

56. Combining striptill with cover crops
on Ron Neumiller’s farm

57. Cover crops planted while stripping
on Joe Rothermel’s farm

61. Small-seeded legumes and grasses can be
planted using the insecticide boxes of most
corn/soybean planters.
Just like granular insecticides, many of the
small-seeded forages can be accurately
metered directly in-furrow or banded just in
front of the press wheel. Setting the double disk
openers about 1/2” to 3/4” deep and running
the seed in-furrow will give the best seed-to-soil
contact and probably the best chance of
success.

63. Cereal rye inter-seeded with soybean
for in-row weed control
Cereal rye and several other CC species that require
vernalization will be planted over soybeans rows
using the insecticide boxes on our planter in 2012

64. Terry Taylor planted radishes on 30” rows w/ hairy vetch,
crimson clover and Austrian winter peas in fall 2010

65. Terry Taylor’s new bio-strip-till rig

66. Planters do a much
better job than a drill

67. A Wheat-Corn-Bean rotation with "tillage" done via RADISHES (!!) into the
wheat stubble every third year! All done with a single 60 ft
30" planter, RTK and one 60ft toolbar. Fertilizer efficiency is very good with
banding, split application and no fall losses.
I came away from there thinking I have seen the future of production
agriculture, at least in some areas.
Sorry to go on so long but this was a very interesting day.
The field of tillage radishes was incredible. The size of those things does
really seem to break up the soil at least as deep as many tillage tools.
I think this may be the future for many folks…
I am no longer a skeptic!

68. A Wheat-Corn-Bean rotation with "tillage" done via
RADISHES (!!) into the wheat stubble every third year! All
done with a single 60 ft 30" planter, RTK and one 60ft
toolbar. Fertilizer efficiency is very good with banding, split
application and no fall losses.
I came away from there thinking I have seen the future of
production agriculture, at least in some areas.
Sorry to go on so long but this was a very interesting day.
The field of tillage radishes was incredible. The size of
those things does really seem to break up the soil at least
as deep as many tillage tools.

69. A Wheat-Corn-Bean rotation with "tillage" done via
RADISHES (!!) into the wheat stubble every third year! All
done with a single 60 ft 30" planter, RTK and one 60ft
toolbar. Fertilizer efficiency is very good with banding, split
8625
application and no fall losses.
views!!
I came away from there thinking I have seen the future of
production agriculture, at least in some areas.
Sorry to go on so long but this was a very interesting day.
The field of tillage radishes was incredible. The size of
those things does really seem to break up the soil at least
as deep as many tillage tools.

70. November 2010
Radishes planted on the WIU/Allison
Organic Research farm on 30” rows
using milo plates in our corn planter

73. Some 2011 data
Cover crop system Relative
corn yield
Volunteer oats 79%
Radishes planted on 30” 99%
Radishes drilled on 7.5” 91%

74. Cover crops are multi-functional!
Feed
livestock
Cover
Crops
Adapted from Magdoff and Weil (2004)

75. Matching specific objectives with species
#1 way to make CC pay Grazing
brassicas, clovers, small grains, a. ryegrass, sorghum-sudan
Nutrient scavenging/cycling
brassicas, small grains, annual ryegrass
Bio-drilling
brassicas, sugarbeet, sunflower,
sorghum-sudan sweet clover, alfalfa
N-fixation
clovers, vetches, lentil, winter pea, chickling vetch, sun hemp, cowpea,
soybean
Bio-activation/fumigation
brassicas, sorghum-sudan, sun hemp, sesame
Weed suppression
brassicas, sorghum-sudan, cereal rye, buckwheat

76. Managing cover crops profitably, 3rd edition

81. Be realistic about
potential cover crop
challenges
Start planning today for next fall!

82. Key considerations
How will I seed the cover crop?
What will soil temperature and moisture conditions be like?
What weather extremes and field traffic must it tolerate?
Will it winterkill in my area?
Should it winterkill, to meet my goals?
What kind of regrowth can I expect?
How will I kill it and plant into it?
Will I have the time to make this work?
What’s my contingency plan—and risks—if the
cover crop doesn’t establish or doesn’t die on schedule?
Do I have the needed equipment and labor?