Ron Morse (Virginia Tech, emeritus) shares how to successfully fit cover crops into a vegetable rotation, including establishment methods, matching the right species to the right methods, recommended rotations and cash crop establishment.
Download the slide presentations (PDF): Cover Crop-Based Production of Vegetable Crops
This session was part of Cover Crops for Soil Health, a three-day professional development workshop hosted by Northeast SARE and Delaware State University in March 2016. All session recordings are available online.
Find more practical information about cover crops in the Cover Crops Topic Room.
Ron Morse is emeritus professor at Virginia Tech whose major focus is cover crop-based conservation agriculture for small-scale vegetable farms. Areas of specialization include establishment and management of high-biomass cover crops to suppress weeds and supply nutrients for succeeding vegetable crops; integration of farmscapes (biostrips) and plant-diverse controlled-traffic beds to alleviate soil compaction, manage insect pests and improve soil and overall farm health; and development and refinement of small-farm equipment.
Complete session recordings
- Overview of Cover Crop Developments Nationwide
- Cover Crop Planting Dates and Seeding Rates
- Cover Crop Cocktails
- Establishment Methods for Cover Crops and Cash Crops in Grain Production Systems
- Fitting Cover Crops in Vegetable Rotations
- Managing Cover Crops for Ecosystem Services in Vegetable Systems
- Cover Crops: Current and Future Directions
- Evaluating and Improving Cover Crop Performance and Adoption
- Cover Crops as Part of an Overall Nutrient Management System
- Managing Soil Health With Cover Crops: Beyond the Basics
- Cover Crop Field Tour Recap and Debrief
- Farmer Panel on Cover Crops