This is a subscriber-only article
Establishing crops using no-till systems continues to grow in popularity in Ireland. The lure of slashing establishment costs and minimising soil disturbance can offer a host of benefits to farmers' production systems and their pockets.
Another area of interest to a number of Irish farmers is the concept of companion cropping. Companion cropping essentially means the cultivation of two or more crops in close proximity.
Two species
The idea is to grow two species of crops together which are mutually beneficial to each other.
With the correct combination of crop species, this system can potentially produce a greater return from the land by making use of ecological processes or resources that would otherwise not be utilised by a single crop.
An example of this may be growing a cereal and legume together, such as oats and peas. The oats can provide a support structure to the delegate pea crop, while the peas will help fix nitrogen for the growing oat crop.
In the right system, companion cropping can work very well and return a greater margin than monocropping, explains Andy Howard, an arable farmer from Kent, England.
Andy spoke at the 2019 National Organic Training BioFarm conference held in Portlaoise this week. The conference is in its second year, with all things biological and regenerative agriculture discussed by national and international experts.
Evolving farming system
The Irish Farmers Journal caught up with Andy at the conference. He explained that his farm has transformed considerably since he returned home from college in 2001.
Over 15 years, the farm’s establishment has evolved from a heavy tillage system, to minimum tillage, to strip-tillage and eventually to no-tillage.
He remarked that this gradual transition has allowed his soil to adapt to a low-disturbance, no-till system.
He also grows cover crops on rotation, which are grazed to livestock. His key aim here was to improve his soil health and structure.
Companion cropping
Andy has several combination crop mixes on trial on his farm. The crops are drilled simultaneously using his Cross Slot drill, managed throughout the season and harvested with one pass of the combine. The grains are then separated using a mechanical separator in his yard.
He admits that some mixes have produced better results than other. A mix of spring oats and spring beans have been the biggest success this year. The margins from this companion crop mix were £290/ha higher when compared with that of beans alone.
50% reduction in five years
Andy set a target for the farm of a 50% reduction in farm inputs over a five-year period. This target was driven by an ever-decreasing margin from using conventional crop agronomy.
From using a companion cropping system in many cases, this has reduced the production costs of each crop due to reduced fertiliser and crop protection spend.
However, there is no single measure to achieve this target, but rather a combination of measures, such as changing agronomy practices, cover cropping and companion cropping, to name but a few.
Listen to the full interview below:
Listen to "No-till and companion crops" on Spreaker.
SHARING OPTIONS: