By Emily Unglesbee
DTN Staff Reporter
ROCKVILLE, Md. (DTN) — A lot of novice cover croppers are heading into this spring, thanks to record prevented planting in 2019.
Some cover crops will winterkill, leaving only residue to manage in the spring. But for common overwintering covers like cereal rye, wheat or hairy vetch, a lot of work lies ahead before the spring crop can be planted.
With DTN meteorologists and others predicting a wet spring pattern for many parts of the country, terminating and managing cover crops should be on the top of farmers’ to-do lists, scientists and veteran cover croppers told DTN.
Here are six tips for managing cover crops this spring.
1. TERMINATION TIMING IS KEY
There are a number of ways to terminate a cover crop: tillage, crimping, spraying the cover with herbicides before planting the spring crop, or planting the spring crop into a live, growing cover and spraying it shortly afterward, called ?planting green,? explained Sjoerd Duiker, a soil scientist from Penn State University.
