Cover cropping offers many benefits, such as weed suppression, building soil organic matter and biodiversity, reducing erosion, and decreasing nutrient loss. But selecting the best species and variety for a farm’s location and goals can be tricky, especially given increasingly erratic weather conditions. Despite this challenge, the number of U.S. farmers using cover crops has …
Continue reading “Evaluating Cover Crop Varieties in Vermont and Beyond “
Written by Amber Machia The Vermont growing season offers a short window to produce, harvest, and store nutrients in the form of forages for dairy cattle, including hay crop silage and corn silage. This process can be challenging, but the result is rewarding for you, your livestock, and your operation. The goal is to harvest …
An armyworm outbreak has been reported in Fairfax and Waterbury areas. The armyworms have been primarily feeding on grass fields. Armyworm moths generally blow up from the south in storms. Please don’t panic, but do go out and scout your corn and grass fields for armyworms. When full grown, the caterpillars can be almost 1.5 …
Written by Lindsey Ruhl UVM Extension NWCS Research Specialist Lindsey Ruhl and 4-H educator Wendy Sorrell, attended the 110th National Association of County Agricultural Agents (NACAA) Annual Meeting and Professional Improvement Conference in Billings, Montana, June 29 – July 2, 2025. There were over 1,200 attendees from 45 states. Presentations ranged from 4-H programming to research …
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When we harvest hay crop silages, naturally occurring bacteria present on the forage are responsible for completing the fermentation process we rely on to preserve the silage. During fermentation, bacteria take sugars in the forage and convert it into organic acids that acidify the material and preserve nutrients. Goals for good silage fermentation: 1. Rapid …
Continue reading “Evaluating Hay Crop Silage Inoculants for Use in Organic Systems”
Course Content UVM Research Specialists Amber Machia and Sara Ziegler have developed a new online course designed for technical assistance providers. The goal of this course is to provide education and resources for new technical service providers with foundational information around grazing planning and providing grazing-related technical assistance to production livestock farmers in Vermont. This …
Summer annual grasses, such as sudangrass and millet, can be good emergency forage crops if your feed inventory is low or you want to supplement pastures during the hot summer months. These grasses love heat and only need a few months to yield 3 to 5 tons of highly digestible dry matter per acre. There …
Continue reading “Summer Annual Forages Fill Inventory Gaps “
By Bryony Sands Spring has finally arrived! Cows are being turned out to pasture, and farmers are busy out in the field. This season is full of new life, but a familiar parasitic arachnid is once again putting a damper on things. Tick populations are becoming more active, and they are on the rise in …
Written by Heather Darby Given the delayed planting of corn due to wet and in many cases saturated soil conditions, farmers are asking, “What relative maturity of corn will be harvested before the first killing frost?” Well, as always, the answer is, “It depends.” As we head into the last week of May, there are …
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Written by Jeff Sanders Corn is a Survivor There are two kinds of crops: crops that struggle to survive and crops that fight to survive. A cotton farmer in Texas once told me that all cotton wants to do is die as soon as it comes out of the ground. Corn is not that way …
Continue reading “Mastering No-Till Corn in Vermont: Lessons from the Field”