Join us for a virtual presentation on the findings from our 2 year SARE research on Summer cover crops for roller-crimper no-till fall planted broccoli production. During this presentation you will learn about the strengths and weaknesses of each cover crop treatment, looking at weed suppression, labor hours, and broccoli yield.

Research Background:

In sustainable, organic vegetable systems, cover crops provide several benefits to the producer - they prevent erosion, reduce water usage, increase fertility, and improve the biological and physical properties of the soil. 

In addition to these benefits, cover crops that are terminated with the roller-crimper to produce mulch for the following cash crop can also provide a significant labor reduction for the farmer. Most research in this area has focused on fall-planted cover crops, leaving little information about summer cover and prompting us to investigate further. With a longer growing season in the southeast, we have more of an opportunity to utilize summer cover crops. Having summer cover or mulch in place during the hurricane season (June-Dec) can significantly reduce damage and erosion to the field.  

In order to investigate which summer covers worked best, we evaluated 1) weed suppression 2) total yields and 3) total labor hours for each treatment including bed preparation, transplanting and weeding.

Our experiment consisted of 5 treatments: 

1) Tilled after Sunn Hemp (100lbs/acre)

2) Crimped Sunn Hemp (100lbs/acre)

3) Crimped Sunn Hemp (100lbs/acre) & Millet (50lbs/acre)

4) Crimped Sunn Hemp (75lbs/acre), Millet (50lbs/acre) & Buckwheat (50lbs/acre)

5) Crimped Sunn Hemp (75lbs/acre), Soybeans (50lbs/acre) & Buckwheat (50lbs/acre)

This event is FREE! Please RSVP and receive the attendance information through the link below.