Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
weed control and insect attraction are noticeable right away. I have my dad cover cropping
his entire tree nursery with a mixture of grasses and legumes. It's work to keep it mowed,
but it's slowly increasing organic matter, improving soil structure and fertility, controlling
erosion and attracting insects and other small animals.
Cover crop selection is an involved decision for farmers and gardeners, who have to de-
cide which of the above benefits are most important and select appropriate crops based on
that, as well as choosing crops that are going to work in their climate conditions. We
gardeners can spend a lot of time making this decision, but for most of us, I believe it's
more important to just get something in the ground that will satisfy the main goals of in-
creasing organic matter and soil fertility. We can also enjoy the by-products of this choice,
including some weed control, and we can always experiment with some different crops to
see what we like best.
That being said, I have a few tips to help the decision. While all cover crops have some
ability to increase soil fertility and organic matter content, and to control weeds and plant
predators, certain plants excel at certain tasks.
