Impact of Interseeding Cover Crop into Silage Corn Grown on Wide Row Spacings
ISSN 2158-9429
Volume 16, Issue 2 - December 2023
Editor: Linda Chalker-Scott
Abstract
Abstract
Using cover crops as soil protective cover or as a winter livestock feed source is a practice several southern Idaho producers would like to incorporate into their operations. Planting cover crops after longer season crops, such as corn silage, has proven challenging. A study was designed to determine if cover crops could be interseeded into silage corn grown on wider rows, increasing cover crop biomass, while maintaining silage corn yield. The three-year study (2020-2022) design used 44-inch and 60-inch twin-rows, with cover crops interseeded at the v4 growth stage, and 30-inch rows with no cover crops as the check. Study results indicated that the 44-inch rows with cover crops statistically matched or exceeded the silage corn yield of the 30-inch check and were statistically higher yielding than the 60-inch rows with cover crops. The results show that in two of the three years, cover crop forage yield was statistically equal for both 44- and 60-inch treatments.
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