New miniseries and Ontario cover crop recipes helps farmers get started with cover crops
Written by: Cory Barstow, Knowledge Mobilization Assistant, Soils At Guelph Previous Next
Growing cover crops can be challenging but with a few recipes it can be easy as pie! Introducing the Cooking with Covers mini-series from Soils at Guelph and the Midwest Cover Crops Council (MCCC). The mini-series provides a comedic take on how to use cover crops. Each episode features a different guest who shares their recipe for success with cover crops.
“We had such a blast hosting the MCCC conference back in February 2021, that we got to thinking, how can we help this live on?” recalls Cam Ogilvie, former knowledge mobilization coordinator for Soils at Guelph. “Turns out, when you bring a few soil health geeks together and let their imaginations run wild, you end up in some interesting places.”
Anne Verhallen, soil management specialist with the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA) says, “These videos have flipped the approach with a bit of fun and solid messages about making cover crops work.” Cooking with Covers was produced to spread information on how people can begin to implement cover crops in their farm practices. The mini-series dovetails with a set of Ontario-specific fact sheets produced by the Midwest Cover Crops Council called Cover Crop recipes.
Each recipe provides a starting point for growers new to cover cropping guiding them through the planning, preparation, and work needed to be successful. Farmers can then tailor the recipe to fit the needs and goals of their farm. The Ontario Cover Crop recipes were part of a KTT—mobilization project by University of Guelph Ridgetown Campus professor Laura Van Eerd and funded by OMAFRA, through the Ontario Agri-Food Innovation Alliance.
Photo credit: Soils At Guelph
Image 1: Dan Petker, gives cover crop recipes a thumbs up in the second episode of Cooking with Covers: Make it Pay
Each episode of Cooking with Covers shares a key recipe for success for using cover crops. The first episode of the series is called Keep it simple and features Deb Campbell, CCA who advises people to know their goals and manage accordingly. In the second episode Make it pay, farmer Dan Petker balances cover crops with herbicide modes of action as a more effective weed control method to get the best return on investment. In the final episode Don’t go it alone, co-founders of the Ontario Soil Network Mel Luymes and Woody Van Arkel declare that working with cover crops is a team effort, recommending finding a peer to ask for help and advice.
“No one person has all the answers to all this. We all need to work with others to make this work.” says Woody Van Arkel, long-time cover cropper and soil health advocate.
Cooking with Covers joins people together to share their knowledge, advice, and experience with cover crops. The goal is to make it fun and easy for anyone who wants to learn more about cover crops.
Photo credit: Soils At Guelph
Image 2: Woody Van Arkel cooks up his recipe for success with cover crops in the final installment of Cooking with Covers: Don’t go it alone.
“The Cooking with Covers video series was one of those rare collaborations that became more than the sum of its parts. Our intent was to use humour to impart practicable information about cover crops, irrespective of the viewer’s previous experience. The result is an entertaining educational resource accessible to anyone interested in agricultural soil health. The series show what can happen when industry, academia, government and producers work together,” said Jason Deveau, application technology specialist with OMAFRA.
Watch the Cooking with Covers mini-series on the Soils at Guelph YouTube page and browse the related Ontario cover crop recipes (https://soilsatguelph.ca/fact-sheets/). For more Ontario-specific cover crop information see the Midwest Cover Crops Council (https://mccc.msu.edu/statesprovince/ontario/).