Fall Cover Cropping Simplified

In today's video we are breaking down fall cover cropping, and right in the nick of time.

We discuss: how to cover crop, how to plant cover crops, what is a winter-killed cover crops, what cover crops will survive the winter, and more!

🚨 Support Videos like this 👇

Support our work (👊) at
or

[rochrich]

When broadcasting an area that has a healthy population of bugs, you might add cracked corn to the mix. It obviously won't germinate but it's cheap and will distract the seed eaters while the expensive seed germinates. It's also bright yellow which helps you see if your coverage is even.

[danimalthemanimal]

No matter my mood, your innuendo amidst the valuable content brightens my day with a smile. Actually, you are hilarious and genius.

[chriskimber]

Cover crop that is a cash crop is spinach!
I seed high density spinach into my cleared squash beds end of September (bc rockies, zone 5a) and they grow a little before snow (end of November) then reappear late March
I mow them mid April to clear dead leaves, quick handweed, and 2 weeks later i get fantastic spinach harvest 3 weeks sooner than spring seeded.
Leaves are sweet enough to ice a cake and the soil is fantastic!
Will bolt end of may

[emkn]

Home gardener here. Trying to establish a new planting space. Used a bag of field peas from the grocery store and a deer food plot mix of brassicas and grains as my cover crops. They’re up and growing and I’m pretty excited about it 🤓

[henkjanssen]

Three years ago I broadcasted 15 kilograms of spelt seed on 300 sq m in octobre, next summer I paid a neighbouring farmer 20 euros to harvest it with his 1970’s combine harvester (“she still works and is all paid off so why buy a new one?”), and he harvested about 120 kilograms of reusable seed that is still my go-to fall cover crop.

[terremcpheeters]

VERY HELPFUL, THIS IS MY FIRST YEAR OF COVER CROPPING.

[timbushell]

It would seem the key paragraph on the article version you supplied is;

"Leguminous cover crops showed a 9.8% yield increase compared to non-leguminous cover crops — like rye, oat, canola and mixture cover crops — which showed no statistical significance. Additionally, introducing leguminous cover crops without fertilizing main crops resulted in a 21.8% yield increase."

[MrIan]

Cover crops are a canary in the kale mine.

[ardenthebibliophile]

Minor note @9:28

Equation should also include total area of that cover crop.

Total seed order = (Total area with mix)*(Recommended seeding rate)/(# species in mix)

[lilolgreyhairdlady]

Perfect timing! Getting ready to prep for cover crop here in mountain Maryland. Also - love your retirement plan!!!

[makilahduncan]

I bought a big bag of sugar snap peas to serve as a cover crop this spring, that I'll hopefully get a few snacks off of in my small garden, I mean it's my entire front yard but compared to your backyard it's considered small.

I just scrapped all the sod layer away and added it to my compost but now I need something to cover that patch of dirt, I probably won't get amazing results since it's a big chunk of red clay and rocks and I don't have much of a budget for bringing in different soil but might as well try and keep my hopes low so I'll be happy with whatever the outcome is haha.

I appreciate the work/ content.

[jordanwj]

greatly informative video per usual, TYSM Jesse.
I do posit that the more species in the mix the more (than a proportional split) of the seed you can add, since polyculture intensely improves individual species' vigor

[iyanla]

Hope to find someday your book also translated in Romanian. I like a lot your topics on living soil and cover crops.👍

[lesliehollands]

Clovers
Organic systems should plant 1/3 to 1/2 heavier to allow for some weed pressures.

[sherimatukonis]

i pulled some potatoes today... must be doing something right - worms, worms, worms... not in the taters, in the dirt... I'm smiling.

[jvin]

This fall I'm sewing my cover crop seeds like Fukuoka "one straw revolution"/"sowing seeds in the desert" by making a seed mix with microrhyzal fungus inoculation in small clay balls to broadcast in the current crop then brush hog the current crop. The clay protects seed against predators and gives them water absorption plus the clay ball making process primes the seed. I'll see how it goes. Prior years I tried naked broadcast that basically did nothing and disk the ground, naked broadcast, and raked in the seed in the soil which works as expected. I'm hoping the clay balls work because that allows me to sew the next crop even before I'm ready to harvest the current crop. Better cycle time.

[sebukulele]

I feel like I'm missing a trick with no-till cover cropping: my current growing area is old mulch with some weeds and grass starting to grow in it, and the areas I'd like to plant in next year are established grass with some weeds. How do you get from that to the nice clean soil you're broadcasting your seeds into? The only way I can see is some kind of tilling.

[johnsix]

I plan on growing Cereal Rye then covering it up with a black plastic tarp 1st week of March so I can plant by the Middle of April.
This way I get the root growth of the Rye and the ability to kill it completely before it gets tall and woody.

[glassbackdiy]

Good show, cheers Jesse. John Kempf recently interviewed by Dan Kittredge was talking about the 14 day window between germination and beneficials innoculation, and this is often the window where pathogens can infect the plant, but not express themselves until much later in the plants life cycle, and that he's developing a mineral suppliment seed spray/treatment to address this, he'd decreased dilution 10x (iirc!) and still not found the limit in trials, seeing faster germination and higher early photosynthesis, I'm trying this with my foliar spary for level 2 plant health pyramid protein synthesis on covercrop seeds this week (Mg, S, Mo, & B with humic to chelate and liquid kelp) could be another useful tool in the Regen box, interview is on Dans channel, Nerd out!

[thepragmaticfarmer]

Still struggling with when to terminate production crops to establish cover crops in 4b. Thought barley was my answer for a fall planting late September in a cold climate. But had limited success last fall. Didn't establish as I had hoped.