Soil Health

ISAP’s Cover Crop Incentives Directory

ISAP’s Cover Crop Incentives Directory provides an overview of cover crop incentive payment opportunities for farmers in Illinois. The directory includes both publicly and privately funded programs as well as a “Stacking Matrix” so farmers can easily determine if they may be eligible to stack payments from multiple programs. If there is information in the directory that needs to be updated, please contact ISAP at hello@ilsustainableag.org

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“Cover Crops Economics” Report – SARE

The Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education’s “Cover Crop Economics: Opportunities to Improve Your Bottom Line in Row Crops” looks at the economics of cover crops in corn and soybean rotations to help farmers answer that big question, when do cover crops pay?

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CoverCrop Analyzer

The cover crop project seeks to provide farmers with a practical web-based decision support tool designed to help manage cover crops in their fields. The project makes use of existing research to demonstrate the potential for cover crops, as well as providing useful information for decision making and management of this practice. It will also seek to apply future research on cover crops as results are incorporated into updates and new iterations of the tool.

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FarmDoc Daily

FarmDoc is a program of the University of Illinois Extension that aims to provide U.S. Corn Belt crop and livestock producers with constant access to integrated infromation and expertise to better manage their farm businesses. FarmdocDAILY aims to publish short, daily articles on a variety of agricultural topics.

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Midwest Cover Crop Council

The Midwest Cover Crop Council website hosts many valuable resources on cover crops including cover crop recipes, selector tools, and state-specific research. Explore their website to learn more.

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Conservation Tillage and Soil Health

“Conservation Tillage and Soil Health” provides a short, animated outline of the basic principles of conservation tillage. The third episode of SARE’s “What is Sustainable Agriculture?” animation series illustrates how many producers are retiring conventional tillage equipment and turning to conservation tillage to improve soil health and productivity.

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