cover crops

American farmers, having endured the wettest 12 months in well over a hundred years and facing predictions that this could be the soggy new normal for the nation’s midsection, are looking at a variety of ways to speed up their processes next year, according to Bloomberg.

The USDA expects storm-ravaged farmers to file more than $1 billion in prevented-planting claims for fields they could not plant this year due to heavy rains and flooding, according to press reports.

Minnesota Rep. Rick Nolan unveiled a bill to make crop insurance available at lower cost to beginning farmers, and to make it easier for diversified farmers to get insurance. Less than 50 percent of small farmers, including organic, livestock, fruit and vegetable, and direct-to-consumer operations, have crop insurance, says a small-farm advocacy group.

A simulation by Texas A&M scientists indicates that winter wheat is a feasible cover crop for cotton growers in the arid Plains, says one of the researchers.

At the University of Nebraska, researchers are experimenting with the agricultural landscape to see if modifications such as windbreaks or cover crops will limit pesticide drift and help bees avoid harmful exposure to the chemicals. Farmers generally plant corn and soybean seeds coated with neonicotinoid insecticides, which can be rubbed off of the seed during planting and land on plants visited by foraging bees, says Harvest Public Media.

Iowa, which has been embroiled in controversies over agricultural runoff and water-quality issues, has announced a novel program to give farmers who plant cover crops a $5-per-acre discount on their crop insurance over the next three years, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council.

Farmers taking part in a survey about cover crops reported a nearly 3-percent increase in wheat yields when cover crops are used in the offseason, says the Conservation Technology Information Center. This was the first time the survey compiled enough responses to calculate the impact on wheat; past surveys associated cover crops with higher corn and soybean yields.

The policies of the "Federal Crop Insurance Corporation, a taxpayer-funded insurance program managed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Risk Management Agency (RMA) and administered by a network of private companies,” punish farmers for environmentally-friendly practices, like planting cover crops, says Kristin Ohlson in FERN’s latest story, which was produced with Ensia.

A variety of USDA programs will be tapped to provide $328 million in technical and financial assistance to improve water quality and restore coastal ecosystems over three years on agricultural land in the Gulf of Mexico area, said USDA. The strategy calls for conservation improvements on 3.2 million acres of high-priority land in 200 counties and parishes.

Farmers in Ohio can get up to $2 million in cost-share money to reduce run-off into Lake Erie, said USDA, acting only weeks after algae blooms in the lake disrupted the water supply for Toledo.

The government should give farmers a discount on crop insurance premiums if they plant cover crops or use no-till practices, said Claire O'Connor of the Natural Resources Defense Council during a teleconference on climate change. She said it would encourage practices that reduce greenhouse gas emissions and also protect soil and water quality.

Using corn residues - stalks, husks and cobs - to make biofuels appears to create more carbon dioxide over their life cycle than the target set by federal standards, says research at the University of Nebraska.

It's well-known that agricultural practices can affect soil fertility, water quality, wildlife populations and pest numbers for good or bad.

Nine out of 10 farmers say they definitely or probably will stick with cover crops after the expiration of financial incentives to add the crops to their operations, said a report based on a survey of 795 farmers nationwide. Half of the participants in the National Cover Crop Survey said they had received some sort of payment for cover crops in 2022.