Interseeding Cover Crops Into Corn

In today's video we use a John Deere 8300 grain drill to interseed cover crops into our corn crop.
Interseeding is one method of adding diversity to a field that would otherwise be a monoculture ecosystem. The variety of different species coexisting together creates good soil structure, provides root exudates that feed the biological life below ground, breaks up compaction, helps with water infiltration, reduces erosion, sequesters carbon, and captures excess nutrients that would otherwise be lost to leaching and runoff. The list of benefits is even longer than that, but we'll keep it to the most obvious ones for the sake of brevity.
I recommend watching our video about side-dressing fertilizer before this one. The two processes occur back to back, so you get a better idea of the big picture when you combine the two videos.
Side-dress video here --- • Unorthodox Fertilizer ...

[@patrickwolf4373]

Thanks so much for a great educational video. It has given me an idea for how to build my own inter-seeder! I’m excited to see how your interseeding crop does!

[@ravenviewfarm]

Hey Patrick! Thanks for watching! Full disclosure, we've almost quit interseeding our corn at this point. For us, the weather has been so erratic that we've had a heck of a time getting an interseeded cover crop to grow over the last four years or so. The last three years were really droughty, so we would interseed and hardly anything would come up. Then this year we had so much rain in late May and all of June that we couldn't get it done at all. Don't get me wrong, I still love the practice itself! It's just getting hard to justify the seed cost when barely any of it grows. Plus we've had to limit our herbicide options if we want to interseed, and the grassy weeds especially are starting to get away on us. All that to say we're still learning, and we will probably have another go at it in the future. I just need to figure out a little better balance with herbicide and timing and seed mix. My advice to you would be to keep the seed mix a little lighter than most people would recommend. Maybe 15 to 20 lbs per acre total. Keep the cost down so that it doesn't break the bank if conditions aren't favorable and the result ends up being lackluster. Best of luck! Any amount of extra diversity is good for the soil and the ecosystem!

[@denniskemnitz1381]

Thank you very much for demonstration.just happened to be on phone at correct time to catch this GREAT demo . In KS

[@GeigerFarm]

Your dad reminds me of a neighbor. My camera assistant left me about a year ago :( and the kids don't get very excited. I must admit that your setup is rather ingenious!

[@ravenviewfarm]

Geiger Farm Thank you sir! I’ve followed your channel for quite awhile, and I don’t know if I’d call this setup ingenious when compared to some of the stuff you’ve put together. I especially admire your custom corn picker. That thing is sweet, and it really cooks along in the field!

[@GeigerFarm]

Ravenview Farm 🙂🙏...years of work, one step at a time. Find the most limiting factor, attack, and keep moving!

[@townes_van_zandt]

Honestly one of the coolest channels on KZbin!

[@ravenviewfarm]

Awww thanks William! It's kind of a weird amalgamation of old equipment and new methods, but being "normal" has always seemed overrated to me.

[@royguralski2466]

cant wait to see results i always thought this would work out time will tell all good luck with it

[@shaungiesbrecht4697]

Is the corn on 30 inch rows? Im trying to figure out how to offset my drill so the wheels dont run on the corn row

[@stephenbutz2621]

And a very pretty camera person !!!❤

[@heinzfarms5674]

Great video! Can't wait for harvest videos!

[@ravenviewfarm]

Thanks! Harvest videos are on the way! We're pretty well wrapped up, so now I'll have time to sit at the computer and edit all of the footage.

[@jeffcallaway7480]

Interested in the results as well! We are thinking of trying something like this in 2021.

[@PennsylvaniaFarming]

Maybe drag some chains or something to get some soil coverage

[@LVFFarmVlogs]

What size is that drill? 30 inch corn spacing? I've been trying to find a Tye 3 point drill to modify to make an inter-seeder

[@ravenviewfarm]

Sorry for the slow reply. That 8300 drill is 12ft wide - 24 planting units spaced at 6”. The corn is on 38” row spacing, and the math works out just about perfectly to keep the drill from running down the corn - though it’s a bit snug! Whenever I drift a little and run down some corn with one of those big wheels, it reminds me of being a kid and learning how to cultivate corn with a 3-pt cultivator. No sudden adjustments! 😄

[@ArmpitStudios]

I’ve seen those planter tires before and wondered why they’re designed with the 2 large outer ridges.

[@ravenviewfarm]

They're called "marker tires." The imprint they leave in the soil gives you a guide for your next pass. To be honest, I just thought it was for visibility, but this spring I noticed that the width of the ribs matches the 6" width between disk-opener units. If you run the drill so the two outer seed disk openers are planting into the rib-marks from the last pass, your spacing ends up pretty much perfect. Not so useful in a no-till setting, but the drill was really made to work in a tilled, prepared seed bed, so it makes good sense.

[@ArmpitStudios]

@@ravenviewfarm Ah! That’s very ingenious.

[@ryanschmit6657]

When you interseed into young corn as in this video, do you add extra nitrogen to your corn figuring that not all of the nitrogen will go to the corn being the cover crop will likely consume some of the nitrogen?

[@jeepcj3b436]

What type of seed are you using for the interseed? Is that the same cereal rye you had last year as a cover?

[@henk-janverhoef2211]

Hi.. à view from a french Farmer who just stumbled on your interesting vids. . Trying to do some conservation /regenerativ farming myself I wonder if your 2'4D herbicide application , just before seeding covercrops is very judicious. In Europe we count 4 weeks before the anti-germinatif side-effect of hormones like 2'4D disappears at full dose. 2 weeks for small dose. Instead we prefer other herbicides for broadleaves if we want to seed covercrops. btw we call that "associated plants" Is this an issue for you? Can you post vids from the résults? Greetings and👍 from France

[@Budd56]

How much lose would you say rye is hurting the corn yields? Interesting video 👍👍

[@ravenviewfarm]

That's a good question. I waited a bit to answer it, because now that harvest is done I can tell you with complete confidence - the rye didn't hurt yields at all. In fact, our corn yield this year was right up there with some of the best years we had using conventional methods. Keep an eye out. Now that winter is approaching I'll be editing all of my summer footage and posting up new videos showing the progression through summer and into harvest time.

[@smalltimefarmer2701]

How do you see where you planted when planting green gps ?

[@calebperkins4268]

hey love the video

[@cowbells52]

Duct tape the holes off inside the drill so you don’t waste as much seed.

[@jefflaue4714]

Hello, how much yield loss do you think you had by running over some on the end rows? Or was the corn small enough that most came back?

[@ravenviewfarm]

Quite a bit of it bounced back, but there was definitely some loss on the headlands with all that turning around. That said, it was only a small percentage of the overall crop, and if these practices result in a yield increase on the rest of the field, then it’s a win. I’ve started to view the headlands as partially sacrificial, so it’s just a shift in attitude. Good observation!

[@denniskemnitz1381]

Or is it 2 discs seeding between each inner rows. Good way to save on machinery purchases

[@ravenviewfarm]

Four openers per row on the middle three, then two per row on the ends (which get covered a second time on the return trip, so every row spacing ends up with four rows of cover crops).

[@denniskemnitz1381]

Does that drill have 8 inch disc spacing

[@ravenviewfarm]

6" spacing I believe!

[@bl688]

Pretty slick outfit

[@denniskemnitz1381]

4 seeding coulters between each row.??

[@ravenviewfarm]

Yep!