(virtual presentation)

Dr. Masoud Hashemi, Professor, Sustainable Agriculture at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA, will be the fifth keynote speaker at CSC2004. His speech is titled "Living Mulch: Taking Cover Cropping to the Next Level" 

Abstract: 

Despite many benefits, the use of traditional cover crops imposes multiple challenges for the growers. The major challenges include 1) the cost of seeds and implementation, 2) annul seeding, 3) termination strategies, which often require disturbing soil or the use of chemicals, and 4) nitrogen tie-up in the soil due to improper C:N. The alternative strategy proposed in this project mitigates many of the challenges mentioned above.

Living mulch (LM) is a modified cover crop system where the ground is permanently covered with a perennial cover crop, often a legume such as white clover, where a cash crop is either drilled or transplanted into it, using no- or reduced tillage methods. Unlike conventional annual cover crops, LM is not terminated before planting the main crop. Instead, it is suppressed using partially plowed or application of weak herbicides in a relatively narrow strip. The perennial nature of this system eliminates the requirement for re-establishing cover crops and minimizes soil disturbance. Additionally, the LM system provides a continuous year-round living root, considered one of the four soil health principles. Other benefits of LM include the addition of a considerable amount of biological nitrogen fixation, excreting various exudates to support soil biota, and being grazed by livestock multiple times when the cash crop is not growing. 

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