Winter Cover Crop Cocktail – May 2013 Update in Pictures

Hello!  Here’s an update on our quest of planting series of cover crops to improve our burned-out soil.  We planted this latest cover crop in September 2012 on 29 acres.  It’s a “cocktail” mix of oats, radish, cereal rye, Austrian winter peas, sweet blue lupin, and crimson clover.  The oats, radishes, and lupines winter-killed in January 2013.  It’s now May, and the rest of the cover crop is blooming and breathtakingly beautiful (maybe I’m partial!)

Most of these pictures are of our six-acre east field.  This is the first cover crop for this particular field – we lightly rotovated the pasture grass before planting in September.  In addition to the cocktail mix, we threw in a 25-pound bag of turnip seed and a 50-pound bag of vetch for the east field.

Beautiful 5-foot tall Austrian winter pea flower. Rye (looks like wheat) and crimson clover in the background. Scott east field May 2013.

Purple vetch flowers surrounded by 4-foot tall crimson clover with rye towering overhead. White flower is a radish that survived winter. Yellow flower is a turnip. I didn’t know crimson clover would get this tall! Scott east field May 2013.

My kind of field of dreams. Cheesy but true!  Scott east field May 2013.

McCarthy field. This is our “best” field with the highest organic matter and only field to get compost so far. Much of the old orchard grass has returned – see fluffy orchard grass seed heads in front. All plants in this field are bigger and healthier. Rye is over 6 feet tall. Orchard grass is lush and 5 feet tall here, compared to 3 feet tall in our old pasture fields. May 2013.

Winter-killed lupin pic taken January 2013. Six-inch tall plant with at least 8-inch tap root (I didn’t get the whole root) with great soil adhesion (evidence of good soil microbe activity). Roots are the point of this cover crop cocktail. Roots stimulate soil biology, improve soil structure, and turn into organic matter. Even though lupines lived only 4 months, they contributed to soil health.

Look closely – this pic is full of turnip seedpods. Turnip lesson: lower the seeding rate! This is the “good” part of the east field. Turnips’ bright yellow flowers dominated the east field two weeks ago and the bee activity was amazing! Scott east field May 2013.

Turnip flowers turning into long, skinny seedpods. If just 5% of the new seed germinates, I will have a major turnip problem! Scott east field May 2013.

Turnips are great cover crops though. They are high in sugar and attract the bacteria that worms love to eat. Here’s a worm and some good-looking soil under a big turnip bulb. I’ve previously had a very hard time finding worms in this field. Scott east field May 2013.

What’s next:  We’ll bush hog (mow) this cover crop in a couple of weeks.  Timing is key because plants can be mow-killed when they flower.  All plants are flowering en masse right now except for rye and vetch, and we want these two dead for sure.  We expect them to flower in the next 2 weeks or so.  This crop will make fantastic mulch and protect soil life against summer’s heat.  In late May, we’ll drill (plant) a summer cover crop.  Reduction in seed cost is our goal for the next cover crop.  We’ve been planting way too much seed at high cost and want to change this.  Stay tuned!

Cover Crop Cocktail’s Remarkable Drought Resistance – Accumulating Evidence?

Last summer, our farm experienced the same extreme heat and drought that broiled most U.S. farmland.  Our pastures went completely dormant, and neighboring corn fields got crunchy brown.  As the drought went on, we noticed that our summer cocktail fields were staying green and growing!  They didn’t look lush, but compared to other fields, they were a cool, green oasis.  We started searching for an explanation and ran into online anecdotes about cover crop mixes’ strange and wonderful ability to resist drought.    We were excited to see these other reports, but we wondered if anyone had any measured proof.

We found some very exciting proof in North Dakota farmer Gabe Brown’s presentation at the 2012 Quivira Coalition conference.  This video of his presentation is so chock-full of interesting information that the segment on drought resistance, which starts around the 9:30 minute mark, is kinda easy to miss.  But I think it’s revolutionary and deserves studying.

Experiment Comparing Cocktail to Monocultures

He partnered with his Soil Conservation District in 2006 to plant and measure the yield of six plants (oilseed radish, purple top turnip, pasja turnip, soybean, cowpea, lupin).  Each species was planted alone in a monoculture right next to the others.  Then, they combined all six into a cocktail mix and planted the mix nearby.  That year was extremely dry, even compared to his normally arid climate.  With an unusual “open winter” with no snow cover, the seeds got planted into dry soil in mid-May.   During the growing period, the plants received just a little over one inch of rain.  The soil conservation district measured the crop on July 31^st.

Here is a picture of his turnip monoculture – obviously stricken by drought.

North Dakota farmer Gabe Brown showing drought-stricken turnip monoculture.

Here’s his cocktail mix.  It’s green and clearly a MUCH better crop than the turnips growing alone.

Green and growing cocktail mix (including turnip).

But the real proof in the pudding is this clipped & weighed production chart.  He more than tripled his dry matter forage yield in a drought by growing a mix.  Unbelievable!  The results are even more exciting because I believe Soil Conservation Districts use standard methodology for measuring production – which lends some necessary scientific credence.

But What’s Going On?

So far, I’ve heard people explain mixes’ drought resistance by:   (1) deep rooting plants bringing up moisture for other plants and (2) mycorrhizae fungi networks supplying moisture to keep plants healthy and growing.

Who knows the real reason?  I think cocktail mixes simply capitalize on how nature has evolved to work over billions of years – via competition and indirect cooperation among many winners and losers (diversity).  Diverse plant mixes seem very resilient, but maybe plant mixes’ great performance under stress is the “normal” standard to which we should compare monoculture performance, not the other way around.  Monocultures are odd, not diverse mixes.

As Gabe Brown says in the video, “Why do we grow monocultures?”  How much more productive could U.S. pastures and cornfields have been if they were highly diverse?  Or if the cornfields at least had a diverse winter cocktail growing before the corn was planted?   For our farm anyway, we’ll be planting cocktail forage mixes for summer grazing.  They appear to be dependable insurance against drought, and much more affordable than purchasing hay at high drought prices.  Thanks for reading!

Winter Cover Crop Cocktail – January 2013 Update in Pictures

Here’s an update on the winter cocktail we planted in mid-September 2012.  All pictures are from our six-acre east field.  This field was in ailing pasture grasses since fall 2008.  Before we planted the cocktail, we lightly rotovated the grass while spraying beneficial microbes, seaweed extract, fish, and molasses.  Before 2008, this field was farmed in roundup ready soybeans for about a decade.  This is a very old farm field with burned out, very sandy soil.    On the bright side, organic matter has increased by more than 1% (now 2.8%) since 2008.  Based on the success we’ve seen with cover crops in other fields, we decided to super-charge this one with a winter cocktail.

The cocktail:  tillage radishes, oats, cereal rye, Austrian winter peas, hairy vetch, crimson clover, and sweet blue lupine.

Catch Crops:  A Source of Pride and Embarrassment!

All seed varieties germinated really well in September, but the tillage radishes and oats grew extremely fast.  These two catch crops (they catch and hold a lot of nutrients) are designed to grow very quickly in the fall and then winter-kill (die) in very cold temperatures.   Because they catch a lot of nutrients and grow really fast, they loudly display the best and worst parts of field.

Check out these two pictures from late December.  These were in a far corner of the field, where I believe the soybean farmer never planted.  The oats grew to three feet tall, and many radishes reached 3 inches in diameter.  (Big radishes are growing in good soil with plenty of nutrients available for catching.)

Winter cover crop cocktail in best part of field. Thigh-high oats and radishes dominating other plants with lush, thick foliage. East field 12.31.2012

Close-up of lush oats and radishes with under growth of peas, rye, crimson clover. Some radishes are 3″ in diameter. East field 12.31.2012

The embarrassing part is captured in this next picture, the poor part of the field.  The oats grew to only one foot tall and started turning red in December.  I believe red leaves indicate phosphorus deficiency, made worse by cold weather.  Most radishes did not reach one inch in diameter.  This is our “you gotta start somewhere” picture.  We know from our previous cover crops that this is typical for our farm, and the next cover crop will do much better because this current cover crop is making big improvements for the soil even though it looks pretty bad!

Winter cocktail in poor part of field. All plants are small with lots of red leaves. East field 12.31.2012

Winter-Kill:  Change is Good

Our farm got the Arctic blast that much of the eastern U.S. experienced in mid-January 2013.  The oats are now totally dead, and the radishes are dying due to multiple nights with temperatures in the teens.  This is great!  Winter-kill knocks back the domineering oats and radishes, allowing more sunlight for the other cocktail plants as they rush into their late winter/early spring growth cycle.  This is one of the benefits of planting a cocktail – different plants flourish at different times, which extends the growth season.

Winter cover crop cocktail after deep freeze. Oats (brown leaves) and tillage radishes are dying. East field 1.26.2013

Dead oats and radishes with growing cereal rye and austrian winter peas. East field cover crop cocktail 1.26.2013

Winter cover crop cocktail after severe freeze. Oats and radishes are dead, but peas, vetch, crimson clover and cereal rye are growing and getting ready for spring. East field 1.26.2013

What We Hope to See in May 2013

Hopefully this field will be chock-full of tall cereal rye with blooming peas and vetch climbing up the rye.  The crimson clover should be blooming too.  I’m not sure if the lupines survived the Arctic blast, but if they did, I hope they bloom with everything else in May.  It sounds like max prettiness!

We hope all the belowground action is just as dynamite.  It would be great if all the legumes produce nitrogen and all the plants release their signature root exudates to stimulate their preferred part of soil biology.  If all this happens, then this field’s soil health will be well on its way to becoming healthy and productive.

We plan to wait until most of the crop matures so when we mow it, the clippings will be carbon-rich and supply mulch for a long time.   Next up for this field is a primo soil-building summer cover crop.  We’re leaning towards sorghum sudangrass, cowpeas, and buckwheat.  Thanks for reading!

Human Impact and Hope: This Type of Farming is Extraordinarily Good for the Environment

I’ve been watching several environmental documentaries on Netflix.  Whatever the focus, every documentary seems to be built upon the theme of “human impact is horrible for the environment – we just can’t help ourselves”.   It’s hard to disagree with this theme when so many U.S. examples are staring at us in the face – the decimation of 75 million-strong herd of Great Plains buffalo, the 1930s Dust Bowl, the Dead Zone in the Gulf of Mexico, the paving of paradises for strip malls, and on an on.  One interviewed gentleman discussed the impact of cities on the environment but said, “Well, people returning to the land isn’t an option either, because that would result in even more land being destroyed.”

A few years ago, I would’ve been nodding my head in complete agreement.  But now, I know there’s another path.  Humans have the resources to provide extraordinary benefits to the environment – healing the land, reversing desertification, and stopping climate change.  I’m not talking about millions of small farms/gardens.  I’m talking about humans using a very low-tech and often vilified tool:  livestock.

Allan Savory, founder of the holistic livestock management framework, has proven that correctly managed herds of livestock can completely heal the land.  It’s all about time management.  The land is pulsed with very high animal impact for a short amount of time and then moved on.   The herd returns months later after the grass has recuperated.  The herd provides another grazing pulse and is again moved on.  Grazing, intense hoof trampling, and manure stimulate grasses to thrive.  Growing grasses extend their roots deeper into the soil profile and take CO₂ from the atmosphere and sequester it into the soil.  Plant roots slough off after each grazing pulse, which puts even more carbon into the soil.  High carbon (organic matter) soils hold water and improve the landscape’s water cycle, which attracts more plant and wildlife diversity.  Land on the brink of desertification is restored to beautiful bio-diverse savannah that sustains human communities.  What work is more noble than this?

Check out this short video of Allan Savory explaining the process and proving that it works.  This video is the longer version – very worthwhile watching.

U.S. folks like Greg Judy are using Savory’s principles with management practices called mob-stocking.  This video is very inspirational and demonstrates how land can be amazingly improved via high intensity livestock grazing.  At the end, Greg Judy states that mob stocking can be scaled down all the way to two animals – good news for our small farm.

The housing collapse has delayed our plans for livestock farming for a disappointing several years now.  We’ve been trying to make the best of the delay by cover cropping to improve our farmed-out soil.  The organic matter has increased by 1 to 2 percentage points, and we feel super good about that!  But, we can’t wait to quit our desk jobs and get started with high intensity grazing and watch our soil improve even more.  Thanks for reading!

High intensity grazing improves land. Herd grazes for short amount of time, then moves.

Soil Quality Indicator: Do You Have Mophead Roots?

Check out this picture:

From November 2012 Acres USA article by Hugh Lovel.

Have you ever noticed the degree of soil adhesion on your plant roots?  The roots on the right are what we want.  And I know for sure that our pasture roots aren’t there yet.  See the pic at the bottom of this recent post.  It resembles roots on the left. 

Mophead roots mean the plant is photosynthesizing very well and is healthy enough to donate a lot of sugary photosynthesis products to soil microbes via root exudation.  When these sugar goodies start seeping out of roots, soil microbes in the rhizosphere (root area) have a 5-star dinner and start multiplying like crazy.  They make the gums, glues and gels that cause soil adhesion and start delivering minerals and vitamins in plant-friendly form so the plant will get even healthier and make more sugary snacks.  Ain’t it neat?

The roots on the left show a plant that isn’t healthy enough to donate many photosynthesis products to soil microbes.  The plant is probably in survival mode.

Mophead roots are a sign of a fully functioning plant/soil ecosystem.  In our quest to increase our soil’s organic matter, mophead roots are the holy grail!  Those sugary snacks are carbon-containing molecules that get digested through the soil food chain and eventually get turned into stable organic matter.  And well-fed soil microbes will help plants make even more carbonaceous snacks, and in turn, more organic matter. 

 We have some grass that survived rotovating and is growing astoundingly well in our cover crop plots.  I’m going to check the roots this spring to see if they’ve reached mophead status.   Thanks for reading!

Happiness! Our Soil’s Organic Matter is Growing by Astounding Amounts

With our very sandy soil (CEC = 4 to 5), organic matter is extra essential.  Sandy soil is notorious for rapidly leaching nutrients and drying out fast, but organic matter can hold onto nutrients and absorb water like a sponge.  This sorta makes up for sandy soil’s missing clay content. 

So check out our super duper chart!  It shows the eight fields under our care (40 acres total), our management decisions, and organic matter data from soil tests.

Progression of the 8 fields under our care from 2008 to 2012.

It’s not wise to think a single data point is accurate, but series of soil tests can show general trends. 

Differences between Scott and Neighbor Fields

From 2010 to 2012, the average percent change in our fields (Scott) is over 50 percent!  This makes us super happy.  That’s a lot of sequestered carbon in just two years.  Since May 2009, the average percent change is over 100 percent, but I’m wary of including the 2009 test because it’s different than the other three Logan Labs tests.  But, organic matter in the low 1% range corresponds to how poor the soil was when we first got here. 

The average percent change in our neighbor’s fields (the three with data) is over 20 percent, still good!  The difference is probably explained by our neighbor’s fields not being in grass like ours are/were, and maybe our August 2011 amateur rotovating (still makes me cringe to think about it) burned out some soil carbon. 

The Three Best Fields

Like I said above, it’s not good to concentrate on single data points, but the organic matter percentages correspond to our perceptions of field quality.  We’ve had a feeling for a while that Scott West, Scott Middle, and Neighbor North and West are the fields that need alotta help.  In contrast, the three fields showing organic matter over 3% make me say “DANG!” when I bush hog them.  The bush hog works hard and slows the tractor’s RPM.  They produce a lot of biomass for sure.  Our McCarthy field was the one I photographed this summer.  The pictures show very strong and healthy plants even under drought and heat stress, something I attributed to compost, which might be true.  

More Organic Matter from Cover Crops?

The test data are mixed (and too few) to see if the cover crop fields stored more organic matter than the grass fields.  (We have no livestock and don’t sell hay.)  I know for certain that our cover crops grow way more biomass than our grass produces, so maybe the difference will show up on our future soil tests.

Upcoming Plans

We’re going to spread this year’s batch of compost, foliar spray liquid fish & seaweed, and broadcast calcium and micronutrient fertilizers.  We haven’t decided what we’ll plant on each field this spring.  We’ll soil test again next fall to keep accumulating data.  But all in all, things are looking up for our rapidly improving soil!

Organic No-Till Farming: The 2 Most Infuriating Weeds

We’re beginning to see fantastic soil improvements from our multiple seasons of cover crops!  However, trying to plant and grow successions of cover crops without herbicides or tillage (called “organic no-till”) isn’t easy.  For a new cover crop to grow well and confer all its benefits to the soil, the existing mature cover crop needs to die.  Unfortunately, mow-killing doesn’t work perfectly.  We don’t have livestock or the impressive roller-crimper tractor implement, both of which are probably better at organically killing cover crops.  Moreover, mowing opens up sunlight that encourages “weeds” to germinate, further complicating our cover-cropping scheme.  This post discusses these weeds and our prevention plan…

The baseline comparison, what all our cover crop fields could look like. We planted this cover crop into rotovated soil (no weed competition). Oats are knee-high. 11/6/2012

These 2 Weeds Aggressively Block Cover Crop Seedlings

Okay!  The two worst “weeds” for us are crabgrass and annual ryegrass.  When we mowed our summer cover crop cocktail in late August, the clippings disappeared pretty quickly and crabgrass and annual ryegrass started taking off like crazy, especially in spots where the summer cover crop was thin.  Both of these weeds are very aggressive, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they “engineer” their soil environment in order to stunt other plants.  When we drilled the new winter cover crop seeds in mid-September, these two weeds kept the new cover crop from germinating.  It’s a frustrating waste of seed money, especially given how beneficial a good winter cover crop can be for the soil.  Annual ryegrass is a decent winter cover on its own, but the variety we have is VERY difficult to control in the spring.  Crabgrass isn’t terrible either, but it dies at frost and leaves the soil without growing roots during the winter.

Green winter cover crop plants on left show where mow-killing our summer cover crop worked well. Brown shows crabgrass, where winter cover crop did not germinate. 11/6/2012

The Organic No-Till Solution:  More Mulch!

Good problem solving involves separating the true problem from the symptoms, right?  Maybe these two weeds are really symptoms, and the true problem is lack of mulch.  In contrast to our 2012 summer cover crop cocktail, our 2011 summer cover crop of sorghum sudan and cowpeas resulted in very thick mowed mulch from these high-biomass plants.  I’ve heard farmers say that Ben Franklin should have added “thick mulch suppresses weeds” to death and taxes in his list of life’s certainties.  We for sure did not have the crabgrass and annual ryegrass problem after mowing sorghum sudan and cowpeas last fall, nor any weed problems in our super thick vetch mulch last spring.  On the other hand, our 2012 cocktail contained a lot of brassicas.  Brassicas have many benefits, but high biomass/mulch is not one of them.  So our big conclusion is:  low biomass and poor weed suppression is a trade-off of very diverse cover crop cocktails.

Volunteer annual ryegrass competition. Lonely lupine and pea are growing, but nothing else.  11/6/2012

Our Plan

In spring 2013, we’re going to allow more time for mow-killing our winter cover crop and spring weeds.  If mowing continues into June, that’s okay.  We’ll then plant sorghum sudan and cowpeas again for their many benefits, including super-fast growth, weed suppression, and mega mulch.  We’ll then wait for frost (around Halloween) to kill the sorghum sudan to plant our final pasture grass mix.  Early November isn’t the best time to plant grass, but we know it will work okay from past grass-planting experience.    On the upside, we’re happy to be getting some experience that is starting to point us in the right direction.  Good education is never cheap!