Richie Hackett explains how cover crops offer multiple benefits for farmers

The Tillage Edge

Cover crops have many benefits for a farmer and also for the wider landscape and this week, Dr Richie Hackett, Teagasc Crops Researcher in Oak Park, joins the Tillage Edge podcast to delve into the benefits and pitfalls when growing cover crops.

Richie cautions farmers about using the same cover crop mixes in rotation with similar plant species and recommends a relatively safe cover crop mix that most farmers can use.

Richie also explains that an early sown cover crop can produce 4t dry matter, utilising up to 80kg/ha N and sequestering 1.2t of carbon.

However he says that predicting when or how much of the captured nitrogen would be available to the next crops is difficult to estimate.

For more episodes and information from the Tillage Edge podcast go to:
https://www.teagasc.ie/crops/crops/the-tillage-edge-podcast/
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