701-448-2474 24 2nd Ave E. in Turtle Lake

https://sites.google.com/site/turtlecreekwatershed TurtleCreekWatershed@gmail.com

Never hesitate to contact us!

Working with producers and land owners to restore our streams and lakes to their healthy natural conditions.

This Month’s Mailer:

Cover Crops History Utility Fundability

Project Interest Form Fill it out Tear it off Mail it back

To Learn More:

Read through this pamphlet. Visit our website. Call, visit, or email our

watershed coordinator at the South McLean SCD

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Cover Crops Cover crops are gaining momentum in the word of crop production due to their soil health benefits. Perhaps the most appealing aspect of cover crops to producers in our area is the diversity of issues it can help with.

A Brief History It’s easy to get the impression that cover crops are a recent fad, as sure to wane in popularity as mood rings or Rubik’s cubes. They weren’t widely planted in recent decades so they’re new, right?

In fact cover crops are not at all a new thing. While they haven’t been widely used in recent decades, the use of clover as a cover crop was a common practice in the decades following the dust bowl. Crop farmers in America came to rely on cover crops for their ground sheltering effect, protecting soil from wind and raindrop impact while increasing soil cohesion by establishing roots and increasing organic matter. That clover is a known nitrogen fixer is but another added benefit.

If that isn’t far back enough for you, approximately 2000 years ago Virgil of Ancient Rome noted increased wheat yield when planting followed cover crops plantings of vetch, lupine, alfalfa, and/or clover. The ancient Chinese too were no strangers to the benefits of cover crops.

Are cover crops effective? Yes.

Are cover crops a fad? No.

Cost Share

Soil Health & Biodiversity Every crop producer knows that it’s not healthy for your soils if you plant the same crop year after year; each plant type benefits the soil in a certain way but no plant can make a healthy soil by itself. Biodiversity also takes place in the soil itself. This soil biodiversity needs to be managed though; if a soil gets hot and desiccated many of the good bugs, fungi & microorganisms in your soil die off. By providing cover from the sun and adding moisture retaining organic matter to the soil cover crops can protect your soil from ecological collapse.

Cost Share: Cover Crop Seed Cost Are you looking to try cover crops this year? We can help many of you by reimbursing you to the tune of 60% of seed costs for cover crops. Like all of our funding, sites located in areas that drain directly to Turtle Creek are most eligible for cost share assistance.

Funding through the Turtle Creek Watershed Project isn’t deadline sensitive, so if you’re considering taking the plunge this year, let us know! We’ll do our best to get you cover cropping before year’s end.

Why Plant Them? Nitrogen Fixation Why do we have to put nitrogen into the soil when 78% of the air we breathe is N2 gas? It takes a lot of energy to break the strong N-N bond of atmospheric nitrogen. Plants don’t have the capacity to do this. Mycorrhizal fungi do have the capacity to break N-N bonds, and there’s no place that this little fungus likes to live more than near the roots of legumes. The practical bit of this nice little arrangement is that if you plant legumes as part of your cover crop mix, you’ll necessarily increase the amount of available nitrogen in your field come next growing season.

Salinity & Excess Moisture All plants take up water and transfer some of it to the atmosphere through a process called transpiration. This process occurs naturally so long as there’s something growing in your field. It’s no surprise then that if you plant winter hearty cover crops between fall harvest and spring planting you’ll help decrease excess moisture and manage the subsequent salinity issues. You can maximize the water uptake potential of cover crops by including high water use species in your seed mix.

Soil Cover & Erosion Exposed soil is subject to erosion. Vegetation shelters soil form the effects of wind and raindrop impact. Roots bind your soil and keep it in place. By keeping your land vegetated between harvest and the following years planting, you’ll avoid losing your valuable soil to erosion.