{"id":532427,"date":"2022-12-29T21:28:14","date_gmt":"2022-12-29T18:28:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/ancient-farming-practice-makes-a-comeback-as-climate-change-puts-pressure-on-crops\/"},"modified":"2022-12-29T21:28:14","modified_gmt":"2022-12-29T18:28:14","slug":"ancient-farming-practice-makes-a-comeback-as-climate-change-puts-pressure-on-crops","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/ancient-farming-practice-makes-a-comeback-as-climate-change-puts-pressure-on-crops\/","title":{"rendered":"#Ancient farming practice makes a comeback as climate change puts pressure on crops"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_89 counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-custom ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title\" style=\"cursor:inherit\">Table of Contents<\/p>\n<label for=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6aef635a3470a\" class=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-label\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #dd3333;color:#dd3333\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/label><input type=\"checkbox\"  id=\"ez-toc-cssicon-toggle-item-6aef635a3470a\" checked aria-label=\"Toggle\" \/><nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/ancient-farming-practice-makes-a-comeback-as-climate-change-puts-pressure-on-crops\/#Ancient_farming_practice_makes_a_comeback_as_climate_change_puts_pressure_on_crops\" >Ancient farming practice makes a comeback as climate change puts pressure on crops<\/a><ul class='ez-toc-list-level-2' ><li class='ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/ancient-farming-practice-makes-a-comeback-as-climate-change-puts-pressure-on-crops\/#What_are_cover_crops\" >What are cover crops?\u00a0<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-3\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/ancient-farming-practice-makes-a-comeback-as-climate-change-puts-pressure-on-crops\/#Cover_crops_create_climate_change_resilience\" >Cover crops create\u00a0climate change resilience\u00a0<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-4\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/ancient-farming-practice-makes-a-comeback-as-climate-change-puts-pressure-on-crops\/#Building_up_the_soil\" >Building up the soil\u00a0<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-5\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/ancient-farming-practice-makes-a-comeback-as-climate-change-puts-pressure-on-crops\/#Cover_crops_arent_a_silver_bullet\" >Cover crops aren&#8217;t a silver bullet\u00a0<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-6\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/ancient-farming-practice-makes-a-comeback-as-climate-change-puts-pressure-on-crops\/#USDA_working_to_get_farmers_to_try_cover_crops\" >USDA working to get farmers to\u00a0try cover crops<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-7\" href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/ancient-farming-practice-makes-a-comeback-as-climate-change-puts-pressure-on-crops\/#Someday_farmers_might_be_paid_to_store_carbon\" >Someday, farmers might be paid to store carbon\u00a0<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<h1><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Ancient_farming_practice_makes_a_comeback_as_climate_change_puts_pressure_on_crops\"><\/span>Ancient farming practice makes a comeback as climate change puts pressure on crops<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\n<p>Fred Yoder in Ohio plants rye and winter peas he never harvests. Larkin Martin in Alabama plants radishes she\u2019ll never eat. A.G. Kawamura in California plants barley that rots in the fields.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Each is part of a small but growing movement to bring back an ancient agricultural practice called cover cropping that was once used to rejuvenate soil but now also likely comes with the added benefits of\u00a0mitigating climate change and protecting against its ravages.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s increasingly getting a push from Department of Agriculture programs and even companies that buy commodities. But mostly, farmers say it saves them money and protects their land.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOur soils keep getting better and better. You take a shovel out and dig deep down and you see the earthworms and the absence of a hardpan. That soil is just mellow all the way through,\u201d said Yoder, a fourth-generation family farmer in Plain City, Ohio.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\"><strong>How does climate change affect you?<\/strong>: <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/USATclimatenews\">Subscribe to the weekly Climate Point newsletter<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\"><strong>READ MORE<\/strong>: Latest climate change <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/news\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"2\" title=\"News\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">news<\/a> from USA TODAY<\/span><\/p>\n<p>For him, planting rye in his fields after he has\u00a0harvested his cash crops of corn and soybeans is no altruistic\u00a0effort. It\u2019s about economics and making his farm profitable.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy biggest driver is trying to save money,\u201d he said. \u201cI\u2019ve cut our fertilizer use by 20%, we\u2019re skipping a herbicide <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/download-scripts-themes-apps\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"9\" title=\"Download Scripts &amp; Themes &amp; Apps\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">app<\/a>lication, and my fields hold more water.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Cover cropping is no panacea to the many struggles farmers face as they operate within the razor-thin margins of agriculture. It can be costly \u2013\u00a0as much as $35 an acre \u2013 and\u00a0takes several years to make a significant difference. It also requires new timing and sometimes new equipment and can increase pest infestations.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But after a few years, fields planted in\u00a0cover crops store\u00a0thousands more\u00a0gallons of water than bare fields during torrential rains, resist weeds&#8217; encroachment more, hold together better\u00a0against erosion, survive droughts better and capture\u00a0more carbon in their soils.<\/p>\n<p>Increasingly, farmers are turning to it as a way to protect against erratic weather and to decrease costs from chemical inputs. The hope, eventually, is that these climate-smart crop practices might get a premium in the marketplace, reimbursing farmers for the climate work their fields do for the nation by returning carbon to the soil.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Ten years ago, only about 10 million acres in the U.S. were planted with cover crops. Today that\u2019s up to about 22 million acres, and the number is increasing by about 8% annually, said Rob Myers, director of the Center for Regenerative Agriculture at the University of Missouri.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>A study last month by researchers at the University of Illinois found that in the Midwest, cover-cropped acreage <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/full\/10.1029\/2022GL100249\">increased fourfold <\/a>from 2011 to 2021.<\/p>\n<p>This heralds the return of a very old agricultural practice, Myers said. \u201cGeorge Washington and Thomas Jefferson would write letters to each other about what cover crops they were planting.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"A corn field that has been harvested, half planted in rye as a cover crop and half with no cover crop.\" data-uuid=\"0ce3750a-64a9-3a24-bc67-0334f5ebb7bf\" height=\"768\" id=\"10912877002\" src=\"https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/aol_usatoday_us_articles_590\/4481830705adb8f849f135c869772837\" width=\"1024\"><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"presto-h2\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"What_are_cover_crops\"><\/span>What are cover crops?\u00a0<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>\u201cA cover crop is a plant used to protect and improve the soil, typically when no other plant is growing in the field,\u201d said Myers, who has\u00a0been studying sustainable farming methods for 20 years.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>What\u2019s planted varies, but it can include grains such as\u00a0rye, barley and oats, vegetables such as\u00a0radishes, and peas and nitrogen-fixing plants like crimson clover.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>As soon as the cash crop, usually soybeans, corn, wheat or cotton, is harvested, the farmer plants the cover crop \u2013 often directly into the leftover stubble.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The cover crop grows just a few inches before winter comes and then goes dormant. In the spring it starts growing again while the fields are warming and drying before\u00a0farmers plant. All that time it\u00a0keeps weeds down by outcompeting them and helps the soil absorb heavy rains.<\/p>\n<p>When it\u2019s time to plant, the farmer kills off the cover crop, either by running a heavy \u201ccrimp roller\u201d over it or spraying herbicide. The cash crop is then seeded straight into what to a traditional farming eye might look like a messy field.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"A mix of cover crops including rye and radish coming up in a field that had been planted in corn and then harvested, on the farm of Larkin Martin near Courtland, Alabama.\" data-uuid=\"24e2fd32-c989-3a74-a6eb-81fec0579380\" height=\"3024\" id=\"10913020002\" src=\"https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/aol_usatoday_us_articles_590\/92adbd9cd36952e70ca60e72c1eab294\" width=\"4032\"><\/p>\n<p>But that litter of dry and rotting corn stalks, ryegrass, clover and radishes is actually creating amazing soil.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you have living roots in the soil year-round, that keeps feeding the soil microbes,\u201d Myers said. \u201cA teaspoon of soil, if it\u2019s healthy, can have as many microbes as there are people on the planet Earth.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Farmers have used cover crops for eons. The <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/iv.ucdavis.edu\/files\/24445.pdf\">Romans<\/a> planted beans in their vineyards to improve yields. But in the 1950s they came to be seen as no longer necessary as the U.S. shifted to new forms of farming.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith cheap fertilizers, particularly nitrogen, having been developed as an offshoot of World War II efforts, cover crops were no longer viewed as necessary for improving soil fertility,\u201d Myers said.\u00a0\u201cThey definitely fell out of favor starting in the 1950s and continuing to decline through the early 1970s.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\"><strong style=\"margin-right:3px\">CLIMATE CHANGE: <\/strong>Weird weather hit cattle ranchers and citrus growers in 2022. Why it likely will get worse.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\"><strong style=\"margin-right:3px\">CLEAN ENERGY: <\/strong>First offshore wind power sites auctioned off California&#8217;s coast. One day it could power 1.5M homes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Those new technologies\u00a0were\u00a0adopted because they worked. New chemical fertilizers, herbicides and insecticides along with constantly improving seed <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ers.usda.gov\/amber-waves\/2018\/march\/agricultural-productivity-growth-in-the-united-states-1948-2015\/\">tripled<\/a> U.S. agricultural output from 1948 to 2015 even as the labor required declined by 75% and land by 25%, according to the Economic Research Service of the Department of Agriculture.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Farmers who would have used the \u201cgreen manure\u201d of cover crops to bolster their soil\u00a0instead poured on fertilizer and left fields bare for much of the year, fearful that any plants beyond the crops they wanted to grow would suck up water and nutrients.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The next big innovation in US agriculture came in the 1980s and &#8217;90s with no-till farming. It was a revolutionary agriculture technique that virtually ended tilling the soil. Farmers would spray a herbicide in the spring to cut down the weeds, then use specially designed seed drills to plant without plowing.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAll you\u2019re doing is cutting a slot.\u00a0The slot is about an inch wide; you\u2019ve got a V in the back that closes it and puts dirt back on the seed,\u201d said Yoder, who switched to no-till 30 years ago.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>No-till works because genetically modified seeds for feed corn, soybeans, cotton and other crops can be sprayed with herbicides that don\u2019t affect them. Today about 90% of these crops are <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.fda.gov\/food\/agricultural-biotechnology\/gmo-crops-animal-food-and-beyond\">GMO<\/a>,\u00a0or genetically modified, and when the USDA did its last agricultural survey, it found that <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ers.usda.gov\/data-products\/adoption-of-genetically-engineered-crops-in-the-u-s\/recent-trends-in-ge-adoption\/\">37%<\/a> of U.S. farm acreage uses no-till farming, most of it\u00a0in the Northeast, the mid-Atlantic states and the Midwest.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>That helped with erosion and soil retention. But increasingly erratic weather, including torrential rains and longer dry periods, have made farmers realize more resiliency was needed.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Also, chemical runoff from overfertilized, conventionally farmed fields began to cause dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico and large bodies of water when excess fertilizer was washed out of fields and into rivers and streams.<\/p>\n<p>It wasn\u2019t until around 2010 that cover crops began trending nationally, though some areas got on the cover crop bandwagon earlier, including Maryland, because of concerns about water quality in the Chesapeake Bay during the 1990s.<\/p>\n<p>Agronomists began to realize that modern postwar practices hurt soil ecosystems. They looked for ways to mimic conditions when the Midwest was covered in prairies, Myers said. Those were soils that had living roots in them all year that supported a complex system of soil microbes, bacteria, fungi and nematodes.<\/p>\n<p>Without cover crops, the microbes in farm soil died out in fall and winter, meaning there were fewer nutrients\u00a0to give crops and less structure to hold water.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Corn in Iowa in May of 2021. The shoots are coming up in a field that had been planted in rye to provide a cover crop.\" data-uuid=\"cd1db3b2-2731-3bc2-993e-f8161cba49e1\" height=\"768\" id=\"10912671002\" src=\"https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/aol_usatoday_us_articles_590\/536d8f859c94c97e9d63e8d78d556fff\" width=\"1024\"><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"presto-h2\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Cover_crops_create_climate_change_resilience\"><\/span>Cover crops create\u00a0climate change resilience\u00a0<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Cover cropping is a rare practice that worked in the past, works especially well now amid climate change&#8217;s effects, and will help prevent climate change from worsening, said the USDA\u2019s Farm Production and Conservation Undersecretary Robert Bonnie.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re conditioned to think about environmental issues where you\u2019ve always got conflicts, but in this case, you\u2019ve got alignments,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>The rewards of cover cropping are numerous, farmers say. The soil has more organic matter, so it requires less fertilizer. It also has channels where the roots of the cover crop have rotted away, along with those made by earthworms, that allow water to infiltrate deep in the soil rather than running off the top.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In California, Kawamura\u2019s family runs Orange County Produce. They take over \u201cugly, abandoned pieces of ground where nothing wants to grow,\u201d he said\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>These fields often have bare ground\u00a0so compacted it&#8217;s like cement. Workers plow it once to open up the soil, then plant cover crops with deep,\u00a0penetrating roots like radishes or mustards or\u00a0barley.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re able to turn them around in three years,\u201d he said. Those fields go on to the Kawamura\u2019s signature crop, a wide variety of green beans that includes Blue Lakes, Yellow Wax, Romano, Purple and Kentucky Wonder.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cGood soil makes a farmer look good,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>For Ray Gaesser, the changes in his soil are helping as climate change shifts weather patterns to heavier, more intense rainfall.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\"><strong style=\"margin-right:3px\">More: <\/strong>Extreme weather reveals a stunning shift in the way rain falls in America.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>He has\u00a0farmed in Corning, Iowa, for 45 years. \u201cWe have never seen 4 inches of rain in an hour before, but that\u2019s what we got in 2010. In the six years after that, we had at least one of those every year.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>He put in waterways and terraces and drains in the fields and thought he was\u00a0doing a good job of protecting the soil.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut when you get 4 inches of rain in an hour, you can\u2019t build a big enough terrace. The water just washes everything away,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Since he started planting cover crops, he has\u00a0seen \u201chuge benefits.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>When the soil was tested, the results found\u00a0it absorbed an inch of water in 2 to 3 seconds. &#8220;When we went a half mile away, to the next farm over which had a recent history of tillage, it took 7 to 8 minutes to absorb that inch of water.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"A field of crimson clover growing as a cover crop on May 10, 2022.\" data-uuid=\"b19f2f47-6e49-3123-897e-6edcfdcefb75\" height=\"768\" id=\"10912867002\" src=\"https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/aol_usatoday_us_articles_590\/3759c88e789f05af79cd3b511a76278b\" width=\"1024\"><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"presto-h2\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Building_up_the_soil\"><\/span>Building up the soil\u00a0<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>For any farmer who has\u00a0done mainstream agriculture, planting cover crops is something of a leap of faith. <span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\">Residue from the cover crops builds up on the soil at first and neighbors look askance.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\">\u201cMy neighbor next to me, he\u2019s 90 years old and he thinks I\u2019m nuts,\u201d said Yoder.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s not a neat and tidy sight the first couple of years. Beginning with cover crops can be\u00a0a nail-biter for farmers who have\u00a0been trained to prize nice, clean, well-tilled black fields.<\/p>\n<p>Instead, they\u2019re seeing a lot of stubble and crop residue build up in their fields and not necessarily breaking down quickly. But\u00a0as the microbes and the worms come back, all that residue just melds back into the soil,\u00a0said Mitchell Hora, a seventh-generation farmer in Iowa. His family farm began planting cover crops in 2013.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOver time, your systems start working better, your soil\u2019s in better shape, and now we\u2019re rocking and rolling.\u201d Hora said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>This year his area was &#8220;super-dry,&#8221;\u00a0but he still had above-average soybean yields. The organic matter the rye left on his fields is &#8220;the armor for now for our soil. It\u2019s basically a sponge.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Research data shows that for every percentage of organic matter in soil, an acre\u00a0can hold 25,000 more gallons of water.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Hora has\u00a0been so impressed with the change in his fields that he launched a consulting company, Continuum Ag, to help coach other farmers as they make the shift.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"A radish planted as a cover crop in a field that will later be planted in corn or soybeans. The soil has been cut away to show the depth of the plant's roots.\" data-uuid=\"5b145d1f-55bc-3615-87dc-31e824d8e02a\" height=\"1024\" id=\"10912883002\" src=\"https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/aol_usatoday_us_articles_590\/634d5423cfa7552f84432f5dfcfc09ce\" width=\"965\"><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"presto-h2\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Cover_crops_arent_a_silver_bullet\"><\/span>Cover crops aren&#8217;t a silver bullet\u00a0<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>After seven generations of farming in Alabama, Martin\u2019s family has seen a lot happen in agriculture. She now has 7,000 acres of cotton, soybeans and corn and has worked hard to build up what she\u2019s honest in describing as degraded soil.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAll the plowing that took place during the 20th century, it loosened up the soil so the roots could grow, but it caused an awful lot of erosion,\u201d she said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>For her farm, no-till was a <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/game\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"7\" title=\"Game\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">game<\/a>-changer, and cover cropping adds further resiliency on top of that \u2013 but it\u2019s not a magic bullet.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s not perfect,\u201d she said. It\u2019s both an added expense and more <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/trip-and-travel\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"10\" title=\"Trip &amp; Travel\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">trip<\/a>s across her fields, which means\u00a0getting the economics right is key. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t call it profitable.\u00a0I\u2019d say cost-effective.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd now we have slugs, which we didn\u2019t have before,\u201d she said. \u201cOn balance it\u2019s positive, but it\u2019s a new set of problems to solve.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>There are also open questions about whether cover cropping could lower yields. Some <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/full\/10.1111\/gcb.16489\">studies<\/a> have found that for corn and soybeans it can, depending on field management. That could be offset by greater resiliency during droughts or intense rains but requires further study, scientists say.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Cotton seedlings coming up in a field that had been planted with rye as a cover crop near Courtland, Alabama.\" data-uuid=\"fe5f838a-defd-331b-b6dd-fec8fd12cfc0\" height=\"4032\" id=\"10912904002\" src=\"https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/aol_usatoday_us_articles_590\/050594bebb680f6ed5ea3e04b0cc32a6\" width=\"3024\"><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"presto-h2\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"USDA_working_to_get_farmers_to_try_cover_crops\"><\/span>USDA working to get farmers to\u00a0try cover crops<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>The Department of Agriculture is encouraging farmers to try cover crops through various incentive programs. This isn\u2019t something that can be done by regulations; it has to make sense for farmers economically, said Farm Production and Conservation Undersecretary Bonnie.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In September the agency rolled out <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.usda.gov\/media\/press-releases\/2022\/09\/14\/biden-harris-administration-announces-historic-investment\">$2.8 billion<\/a> toward supporting climate-smart farming, some of which will go to cover crop support. There\u2019s also a $5-an-acre rebate for farmers using cover crops off their crop insurance.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\">It\u2019s part of \u201cde-risking\u201d the shift. \u201cAt the end of the day, these practices are all going to have to pencil out for the farmer,\u201d Bonnie\u00a0said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\">USDA efforts such as Environmental Quality Incentives Program and the Conservation Stewardship Program have increased farmer participation in cover cropping.<\/span> Researchers in <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/full\/10.1029\/2022GL100249\">Illinois<\/a> found a strong correlation between such funding and adoption of the practice.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\">The payments only last for a few years and are meant to be enough to tip farmers over into giving it a try, not underwriting the entire cost.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"exclude-from-newsgate\">\u201cWe&#8217;re not going to subsidize everything. But the first year, we&#8217;re offering to pay $25 an acre. Second year, $15 an acre. Third year, $10 an acre,\u201d said John Johnson, a farmer and coordinator at Farmers for Soil Health, a newly-created partnership between soybean, corn and pork groups to encourage farmer-led cover crop programs. The group will be giving grants to farmers to try cover crops.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The hope is that the benefits to the farmers, and the climate, will be big.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf we\u2019re going to make a significant gain on the agricultural side, and we can, there\u2019s a lot of opportunities for us to reduce greenhouse gas emissions,\u201d Bonnie said.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Cows grazing on a cover crop of rye that has been planted over the remains of recently-harvest corn near Corning, Iowa. Nov. 26, 2022.\" data-uuid=\"cf4cf784-780b-3588-95ac-2c39c33dbca2\" height=\"3024\" id=\"10912726002\" src=\"https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/aol_usatoday_us_articles_590\/5009807591b0c53f7ed9afc916268eb7\" width=\"4032\"><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"presto-h2\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Someday_farmers_might_be_paid_to_store_carbon\"><\/span>Someday, farmers might be paid to store carbon\u00a0<span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\n<p>The hope is that someday farmers will be paid for the work of creating more robust soils that sequester larger amounts of carbon in them\u00a0as a way to combat climate change.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But large-scale\u00a0data on cover crops and carbon sequestration is lacking and more research is needed, scientists say. Some research has found <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.jswconline.org\/content\/73\/5\/117A\">large<\/a> amounts of carbon being sequestered, while others have found\u00a0<a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/acsess.onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/abs\/10.1002\/saj2.20378\">less<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Though some companies have already begun to offer farmers a few dollars an acre for their efforts, the system is still in its earliest \u2013 and unregulated \u2013 days.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cCarbon is like the Wild, Wild West right now in agriculture,\u201d Johnson said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Being able to prove that a given farmer or a given field has taken a certain amount of carbon out of the atmosphere and put it back into the soil isn\u2019t easy and isn\u2019t cheap, but eventually it should be possible, experts say.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe big, hairy, audacious goal\u201d is that farmers will be able to sell, at a premium, crops they grow with sustainable and carbon-fixing practices said Grey Montgomery, who heads agricultural products and operations for DTN, a data and <a href=\"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/category\/technology\/\" data-internallinksmanager029f6b8e52c=\"4\" title=\"Technology\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">technology<\/a> firm in Tennessee. That will mean on-farm visits, satellite tracking, and soil testing and probes.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s all going to be about measurement, reporting and verification,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>In Alabama, Martin just wants to make her farm a little more resilient, a little more profitable and a little better every year. Over the past few years she has\u00a0seen more of her neighbors plant cover crops in the winter.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe drive along and look at somebody else\u2019s fields and think, \u2018Hm, I wonder what they planted this year?\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>It has\u00a0become a big conversation in her area, at\u00a0least for those putting their toes in the water, she said. \u201cThe ones that think we\u2019re crazy, they don\u2019t tell me.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><em>This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Cover crops can help fight climate change effects on US farms<\/em><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong><span style=\"color: #ff6600;\">If you liked the article, do not forget to share it with your friends. Follow us on\u00a0<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\"><a style=\"color: #ff0000;\" href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/publications\/CAAqBwgKMLG0nwswvr63Aw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\">Google News<\/a><\/span>\u00a0too, click on the star and choose us from your favorites.<\/span><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">For forums sites go to <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/forum.buradabiliyorum.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Forum.BuradaBiliyorum.Com<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<blockquote>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>If you want to read more News articles, you can visit our <span style=\"color: #ff9900;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/news\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">News category.<\/a><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"color: black;\"><a style=\"color: #ff9900;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.usatoday.com\/story\/news\/2022\/12\/28\/cover-crops-can-help-fight-climate-change-effects-us-farms\/10798179002\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Ancient farming practice makes a comeback as climate change puts pressure on crops Fred Yoder in Ohio plants rye and winter peas he never harvests. Larkin Martin in Alabama plants radishes she\u2019ll never eat. A.G. Kawamura in California plants barley that rots in the fields.\u00a0 Each is part of a small but growing movement to&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":532428,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/media.zenfs.com\/en\/aol_usatoday_us_articles_590\/4481830705adb8f849f135c869772837","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[70897],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-532427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=532427"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532427\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/532428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=532427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=532427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=532427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}