Vegetable Farmers Test Summer Cover Crop Mixes

Practical Farmers of Iowa has published a report on farmer-led research into summer cover crop mixes in vegetable rotations. Four vegetable farmers tested increasingly summer cover crop mixes to determine which produced the most biomass on ground that was fallow between early summer and fall crops. The trials involved buckwheat-based cover crops mixed with as many as four other species. The most diverse mix only yielded significantly more biomass on one farm, where the farmers noted that it produced so vigorously that it was difficult to terminate. Learn more about the details and results of this trial in the online report.