Feldspar
Member
- Location
- Essex, Cambs and Suffolk
I did a bit of reading to try to find evidence to back up the idea that by growing a cover crop and creating a mulch which suppresses weed one could reduce or eliminate herbicide usage. One paper suggested that their cover crop mulch reduced weed numbers by 78% but had no effect on total weed biomass (i.e. each weed has less competition and so grew more vigorously). If one was using herbicides then this last finding might be useful. Reducing the density is useful because there are simply less individual weeds to kill, although perhaps if each is more vigorous the efficacity of the spray might be reduced.
So the question is whether it is a naive hope that cover crops can make huge inroads in reducing herbicide usage? Rather might they simply be one extra tool in a very large toolchest which is required to stay on top of problem weeds?
For:
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/4 ... 1634365323
http://agris.fao.org/agris-search/searc ... ;US9745251
Against:
http://hortsci.ashspublications.org/con ... /410.short
http://www.wssajournals.org/doi/abs/10. ... 2.0.CO%3B2
http://link.springer.com/article/10.100 ... 10?LI=true
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/3 ... 1634365323
Thoughts and experiences please!
So the question is whether it is a naive hope that cover crops can make huge inroads in reducing herbicide usage? Rather might they simply be one extra tool in a very large toolchest which is required to stay on top of problem weeds?
For:
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/4 ... 1634365323
http://agris.fao.org/agris-search/searc ... ;US9745251
Against:
http://hortsci.ashspublications.org/con ... /410.short
http://www.wssajournals.org/doi/abs/10. ... 2.0.CO%3B2
http://link.springer.com/article/10.100 ... 10?LI=true
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/3 ... 1634365323
Thoughts and experiences please!