What We Learned When It Didn’t Rain

Let me take a little side trip here and share my second experience of flying on covercrops. Several years later we needed help in getting the cover crop planted and again we opted to have the seed flown on, part in soybeans and the other part in cotton. From a single species of rye, we had progressed to a mix of several cover crop seed. The mix had black oat, Austrian winter pea, crimson clover, and tillage radish. We flew the seed on in mid-September, the leaves dropped, it didn’t rain, it didn’t rain, and then it didn’t rain.

A week to ten days later there was no evidence of a covercrop. Three weeks later there was a radish here and there in the bean fields and nothing showing in the cotton fields.

Then we had a rain. A week or so later the soybean fields had radish and clover showing, but not the best stand in the world. The cotton fields had a few radishes and clover present. Neither the bean or the cotton fields had any winter pea or black oat. The soybean fields had a much better stand although far from perfect. The cover crop in the cotton fields were struggling.

I went from knowing everything there was to know about establishing a cover crop to knowing not a blessed thing about planting cover crop, but without failure nothing is learned. Failure causes questioning, study, reflection, correction, the acceptance of correction, and the best thing of all, progress.

You had better believe I questioned what was looking like a failure. There was a pile of reflection and study. I for sure needed to correct the mistakes. Here is what I learned.

Rye is the number one product for covercrops for a reason. Why? Because rye is as bulletproof as it gets. You can spread rye in the middle of a highway and snake can sweat on it and rye will come up. That might be a slight exaggeration, but rye will cover up a lot of errors in management.

Black oats are very iffy without good seed to soil contact, as are Austrian winter peas. Neither of those two products should have been in the mix if it is being flown on. Crimson clover and tillage radish are both small seeded with a hard coat. They both will lay and wait for conditions to improve and then germinate.

Another thing learned is that when flying a cover crop on it is a good thing to be aware of current soil moisture situations and aware of the extended weather forecast. If the fields are already dry and there is no rain on the horizon, you might need to adjust your planting method or wait for better conditions for the fly on. The observation that the bean fields fared better than the cotton fields in the beginning was because the beans are planted closer together and have a thicker canopy resulting in more leaves to drop that will cover the seed.

Another interesting observation is that over time the covercrop in the cotton fields closed the gap with the covercrops in the bean fields and by spring the cover crops were essentially equal. There’s that horseshoe again. Still there was very little black oat or Austrian winter pea growing in the soybean fields or in the cotton fields.

As stated, one of the biggest obstacles to overcome is the lack of time and labor to get the cover crop planted in a timely fashion. When pushed to get the cover crop planted we were able to utilize an existing, but unknown to us, method of planting our first cover crop. It is amazing how pressure will enhance creativity.