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Vetch Cover Crop Recommended for Organic Zucchini

In a new study, the popular cover crop vetch (Vicia sativa L.) was used in a two-year field experiment designed to determine the effects on organic zucchini yield and quality of vetch residue management strategies incorporating green manure using a roller-crimper (RC) and organic fertilizers.

vetch
Vetch

To allow for timely crop rotation in organic farming, the growing cycle of cover crops is often terminated before natural maturity using mechanical chopping and/or plowing, field disking, mowing or crushing with a roller-crimper. Innovative conservation tillage production systems using RC technology to end cover crops are gaining popularity. The technique uses one or two passes of the RC to flatten the cover crops, leaving a thick mulch layer into which the next crop is sown or transplanted. The thick mulch hinders the development of weeds during the critical growing period, contributes to reduced soil erosion and increases soil moisture and fertility.

Researchers used municipal solid waste compost, anaerobic digestate and a commercial organic fertilizer in the field experiments designed to determine yield, yield components, crop quality, and soil nutritional status in organic zucchini fields in southern Italy.

“Our results showed that zucchini yield was influenced positively by the vetch residue management strategy, although the response was significantly different between years,” the scientists said. “The vetch cover crop increased marketable zucchini yield in the first year by 46.6 percent compared with the fallow treatment, indicating that this fertility-building crop could reduce off-farm nitrogen (N) fertilizer input for subsequent crops. Averaging over two years of the experiment, marketable zucchini yield increased by 15.2 and 38 percent with the roller-crimper mulch and green manure plow-down, respectively, compared with the fallow treatment, although differences were significant only in the first year.”

The application of organic fertilizers in vetch management plots increased marketable zucchini yield by 21.8 percent in the first year compared with the unfertilized control.

This article appears in the December 2013 issue of Acres U.S.A.