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Agronomy and Crop Sciences Commons

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Articles 1 - 5 of 5

Full-Text Articles in Agronomy and Crop Sciences

Nutrient Loading Reduction In A Tile Drained Agricultural Watershed Through Watershed-Scale Cover Cropping: A High Resolution Analysis, Benjamin Gerald Bruening Apr 2017

Nutrient Loading Reduction In A Tile Drained Agricultural Watershed Through Watershed-Scale Cover Cropping: A High Resolution Analysis, Benjamin Gerald Bruening

Theses and Dissertations

Nutrient pollution originating from agricultural regions in the Midwest is a serious issue, leading to pollution of drinking water sources as well as large hypoxic zones in the Gulf of Mexico. The source of much of this contamination has been shown to be runoff from agricultural fields in the Upper Mississippi River Basin. One method that has been shown to reduce this pollution from the Upper Mississippi River Basin is the planting of winter cover crops. Winter cover crops such as rye and tillage radish have been shown to significantly reduce nitrate exported from agricultural fields, even in tile-drained watersheds …


Improving Water Resilience With More Perennially Based Agriculture, Andrea D. Basche, Oliver F. Edelson Jan 2017

Improving Water Resilience With More Perennially Based Agriculture, Andrea D. Basche, Oliver F. Edelson

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Land conversion from natural to managed ecosystems, while necessary for food production, continues to occur at high rates with significant water impacts. Further, increased rainfall variability exposes agricultural systems to impacts from flood and drought events. In many regions, water limitations are overcome through technological approaches such as irrigation and tile drainage, which may not be sustainable in the long term. A more sustainable approach to combat episodes of floods and droughts is to increase soil water storage and the overall green water efficiency of agroecosystems. Agricultural practices that promote “continuous living cover,” such as perennial grasses, agroforestry and cover …


The Trouble With Cover Crops: Farmers’ Experiences With Overcoming Barriers To Adoption, Gabrielle E. Roesch-Mcnally, Andrea D. Basche, J. G. Arbuckle, John C. Tyndall, Fernando E. Miguez, Troy Bowman, Rebecca Clay Jan 2017

The Trouble With Cover Crops: Farmers’ Experiences With Overcoming Barriers To Adoption, Gabrielle E. Roesch-Mcnally, Andrea D. Basche, J. G. Arbuckle, John C. Tyndall, Fernando E. Miguez, Troy Bowman, Rebecca Clay

Department of Agronomy and Horticulture: Faculty Publications

Cover crops are known to promote many aspects of soil and water quality, yet estimates find that in 2012 only 2.3% of the total agricultural lands in the Midwestern USA were using cover crops. Focus groups were conducted across the Corn Belt state of Iowa to better understand how farmers confront barriers to cover crop adoption in highly intensive agricultural production systems. Although much prior research has focused on analyzing factors that help predict cover crop use on farms, there is limited research on how farmers navigate and overcome field-level (e.g. proper planting of a cover crop) and structural barriers …


Cover Crop System To Control Charcoal Rot In Soybeans, Gretchen Sassenrath, C. R. Little, C. J. Hsiao, D. E. Shoup, X. Lin Jan 2017

Cover Crop System To Control Charcoal Rot In Soybeans, Gretchen Sassenrath, C. R. Little, C. J. Hsiao, D. E. Shoup, X. Lin

Kansas Agricultural Experiment Station Research Reports

This research compares methods of controlling charcoal rot in soybean cultivars from three maturity groups commonly grown in southeast Kansas. The results indicate that a mustard plant that produces high levels of glucosinolates can be used as a cover crop to reduce the charcoal rot disease in soybeans.


Fallow Replacement Crop (Cover Crops, Annual Forages, And Short-Season Grain Crops) Effects On Wheat And Grain Sorghum Yields, J. D. Holman, T. Roberts, S. Maxwell Jan 2017

Fallow Replacement Crop (Cover Crops, Annual Forages, And Short-Season Grain Crops) Effects On Wheat And Grain Sorghum Yields, J. D. Holman, T. Roberts, S. Maxwell

Kansas Agricultural Experiment Station Research Reports

Producers are interested in growing cover crops and reducing fallow. Growing a crop during the fallow period would increase profitability if crop benefits exceeded expenses. Benefits of growing a cover crop were shown in high rainfall areas, but limited information is available on growing cover crops in place of fallow in the semiarid Great Plains. A study was conducted from 2007–2017 that evaluated cover crops, annual forages, and short season grain crops grown in place of fallow. In the first experiment (2007-2012), the rotation was no-tillage wheat-fallow. The second experiment (2012-2017) rotation was no-tillage wheat-grain sorghum-fallow. This report presents results …