RegenPGC & Iowa Learning Farms collaborate on producer focused video

In our newest video, “A New Direction in Cover Crops Developing Perennial Ground Cover for Corn Systems in the Midwest,” Professor and Research and Extension specialist Dan Andersen (Iowa State University) provides producers with information from the RegenPGC project on perennial ground cover in row crop cropping systems. Dan addresses the vital question, “Can we come up with a cover crop that we only have to plant once and then manage instead of reestablishing it every year to help with environmental services while we are producing our row crops?

The video focuses on:
– Corn selection
– Types of groundcover
– System management (including groundcover establishment and suppression)
– Ecosystem services (potential to reduce spring herbicide applications & to reduce insect presence).

This video is part of a collaboration between the RegenPGC project and Iowa Learning Farms – https://www.iowalearningfarms.org/.

RegenPGC featured in No-Till Farmer Magazine

Check out the no-till farming community’s view of our perennial ground cover project in the latest edition of No-Till Farmer magazine.

Producer Charles Martin’s article, “Productivity Meets Conservation with Perennial Groundcovers & Strip-Till,” explains our perennial ground cover project from the perspective of the working no-till farmer. The article is available online (free, registration required).

Dr. Cynthia Bartel and her writing team honored by Agronomy Journal

Congratulations to RegenPGC’s Dr. Cynthia Bartel and her co-authors (Kenneth J. Moore, Shui-Zhang Fei, Andrew Lenssen, Roger L. Hintz & Samantha M. Kling) on having their paper “Evaluating Chemical Suppression Treatments to Alter the Red: Far-Red Ratio in Perennial Groundcovers for Maize Production” selected as an Agronomy Journal “Editor’s Choice Article” for the year 2022.

The article is available as an Open-Access publication at http://www.mdpi.com/2073-4395/12/8/1854.

“Editor’s Choice articles are based on recommendations by the scientific editors of MDPI journals from around the world. Editors select a small number of articles recently published in the journal that they believe will be particularly interesting to readers or important in the respective research area. The aim is to provide a snapshot of some of the most exciting work published in the various research areas of the journal.”

RegenPGC releases latest progress report

The RegenPGC research team has a new progress report. This report is the latest on our research enterprise focused on perennial cover crops and can be found here. Each of our Themes and Objectives provides updates on their research and outreach activities from Aug. 1, 2023, to Oct. 31, 2023.

Our goal is to be concise and share our work in ways that help bring stakeholders interested in perennial cover crops to an understanding of what we are doing to get closer to our vision of “well-adapted perennial ground cover  systems for a range of farm operations that require low labor inputs, provide significant ecosystem benefits, increase row crop resiliency, and have similar economic profiles as conventional row crop practices.” Check out our report and see how close we are to our goals.

RegenPGC drops two new progress reports

It’s fall, leaves are dropping, and so are reports. Our team just finished two reports which are now available on our website. We require each of our Themes and Objectives to provide project updates four times a year. These reports let us know what we have accomplished and what is yet to be done as we move forward on our Perennial Ground Cover Vision. Our team, including 21 graduate students, has done an a fantastic job of moving our research agenda ahead over two short years. Check out our progress:

Listen to the data, and learn!

screen shot Regenpgc.org website
New, and improved RegenPGC tagline and “Goals and Vision” statement

Good research is all about paying attention to pertinent data. By listening to the savvy producers in our FLAG* group, we decided to change our RegenPGC tagline and our Goals and Vision Statement.

We know too many of you have been subject to those mind-numbing meetings where you must develop the perfect mission statement. Lucky for us, we didn’t have to do that. We had been thinking about and applying for funding for our Perennial Groundcover vision long before we were fortunate to be funded by the USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture. So, when we put our website together, we were sure that we had distilled the language to express just what we needed to say.

We were close, but we did not nail it. When we met with the FLAG group yesterday, the participants pointed out that farmers are more interested in “reliability” in their cropping systems than worrying about the finer points of risk. Sure, risk is part of the everyday life of those making their living on farm ground. But we were told that risk is something to manage and that what farmers need before adopting new strategies and techniques, like adopting a perennial ground cover approach, is an assurance of reliability.

It was an “ah ha” moment for our team members, and before sunset, we changed our language and remembered that good data is everywhere. You just have to look and listen.
*Farmer and Landowner Advisory Group