what are the benefits of cultivation, fallowing, tillage, crop cover, drainage, double cropping, irrigation ?
Image by USDAgov
Cover crop (foreground) at Leafy Greens, operated by farmer Tom Heess, in the Salinas Valley, California on Thursday, June 16, 2011. Leafy Greens grows row crops of lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower sweet peas and seed beans. He uses rotational crop plantings to control weeds and plant disease. When a plot of land is at rest, he plants a cover crop of barley and rye grass because the roots hold the topsoil reducing erosion of the soil. He is converting his irrigation system from conventional sprinklers to micro irrigation. Where one system produces runoff and erosion of the soil; the other has little or no erosion, less maintenance, easy harvest and less water is needed. When seasonal rains produce runoff, the silt that flows with it is caught in sediment ponds. The ponds have grass, bushes and trees to hold the structure and allow the silt to settle. Spillways lead to holding ponds and eventually the Salinas River, a tributary of the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. So far, because of its design and efficiency, no water has made it to the river. USDA Photo by Lance Cheung.
Question by Snowcones_are_glamourous: what are the benefits of cultivation, fallowing, tillage, crop cover, drainage, double cropping, irrigation ?
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One Response to what are the benefits of cultivation, fallowing, tillage, crop cover, drainage, double cropping, irrigation ?
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Cultivation aerates the soil and helps control weeds.
Fallowing rests the soil and preserves soil moisture for the next years crop.
Tillage turns under old crop residue, prepares the seed bed for planting and helps control weeds.
A cover crop is is planted to protect the soil from erosion during the winter months. The cover crop is often turned under in the spring as a green manure crop to add to the organic matter and fertility of the soil.
Proper drainage gets the excess water off of the soil preventing it water-logging and drowning out the plants. Proper drainage gets the water off in a controlled manner preventing erosion.
The benefits of double cropping are mainly economic. Growing a crop like wheat through the winter and harvesting it in the spring and then planting a crop like soybeans gives you two crops per year on the same land.
Irrigation allows crops to be grown on land that otherwise could not produce a crop. Sometimes irrigation is used to keep the crops growing through a drought giving higher yields or saving the crop altogether.
john h
December 9, 2011 at 4:25 pm