Research and Outreach
We’ve built a thriving trans-disciplinary community of agricultural experts, engineers and data scientists, social scientists, educators, commodity boards, NGOs, agribusiness leaders, and technology companies. Since 2019, our research teams have collected visual, spatial, attribute, qualitative, and other forms of data that inform our development of technology that gives farmers science-based recommendations tailored to their management styles. Many research projects are ongoing. Our extension team provides the vital link between new technology and the agricultural community, and our education team offers an undergraduate course on food production and its environmental impacts through the lens of cover cropping.
Research
Outreach
On-Station Research
From our multi-year research projects, nitrogen cycling data will support farmer decision making for site-specific cover crop and nitrogen management. Pest interactions data will clarify the effects of cover crop termination on insect populations, diseases, and weeds to help farmers better manage their operations.
On-Farm Research
We partnered with farmers in 25 states to study factors affecting cover crop performance. The research teams used common protocols to study the short-term effects of cover crops on farms that currently use cover crops but may differ in management. They collected data on field history and management, real-time field weather and soil conditions, cover crop biomass, and cash crop yield. By studying a range of sustainable farming practices, PSA aims to better understand the impacts of factors such as termination timing, soil conditions, and climates across the United States—and build predictive tools for growers to support management choices.
Social Science Research
We’ve studied growers’ attitudes, priorities, social networks, and experiences with cover cropping. In our Grower Think-Tank sessions with PSA on-farm partners, we sought to understand how cover crop science is relevant to farmers’ field experiences, to inform future research.
We surveyed farmers to understand where they go for information, as well as their attitudes toward production practices, data sharing, and incentive programs. Our findings will guide our communication strategies to help farmers get current, relevant information from sources they trust.
Through interviews with PSA and non-PSA farmers in nine states, we sought to identify worldviews that reflect shared perspectives, experiences, and priorities; these will inform our communication strategies tailored to those worldviews.
Because our early research showed that growers wanted easy access to clear information about cover crop incentives, we conducted interviews and participatory workshops with farmers and agricultural advisors to guide development of PSA’s Cover Crop Incentives Explorer Tool.
Economics Research
Our team studied financial factors of establishing and managing cover crops, as well as barriers to adoption, and they analyzed the economic impacts of cover crops on yield, pests, and nitrogen management. Their work informed the PSA Cover Crop Economic Decision Calculator, which helps farmers understand how cover cropping can affect their yield and revenue.
Education
Extension agents and other agriculture professionals help to verify, test, and promote our decision support tools. Education and training are core to our work and occur through multiple channels, including webinars, field days, conferences, and written and video media. We reach a broad audience through our deep ties and collaborations with industry leaders, educators, researchers, and others engaged with the agricultural community.
College curricula need to evolve to reflect rapid advancements in cover crop research. Our undergraduate three-credit course, Cover Crops in Agroecosystems, has been offered at seven universities since 2021. The course uses cover cropping as the lens through which to examine the physical, biological, and chemical processes that underpin agriculture and its impact on the environment.
The course includes asynchronous lectures with recorded presentations, an in-person laboratory session, and a virtual synchronous discussion session in which students and instructors from all seven universities meet via Zoom. The course includes 12 modules in which students: 1) explore the management, environmental, economic, and social considerations of cover crops across a diversity of agricultural production systems, and 2) grow cover crops, measure benefits and trade-offs, and apply knowledge to make management and policy recommendations. The course prepares students for opportunities associated with cover cropping in production, research, service, industry, and policy.