Take your crops to the next level in 2025

The start of a new year offers the perfect opportunity to evaluate current management practices, look into new ones, and research new innovations or tools that can help you reach your cropping goals. Not sure where to start? Here are a few of the trends that we’ve seen farmers lean into over the past year.

Farmers are making it a priority to get all that they can out of their farmland. One of the primary ways we’ve farmers do this is by incorporating cover crops into their rotation, with the goal to sequester nutrients (mainly N, P, K) in the soil to feed the incoming crop. Dairies specifically are starting to look at planting custom, multi-species cover crop blends (legumes and grass species) for additional reasons. Cover crops reduce erosion and compaction, improve plant nutrient availability and weed control and increase organic matter.

With AgSource cover crop biomass analysis testing, farmers are better understanding what nutrients are left from the cover crop and what will be available for the next crop. The test provides estimated timing of soil nutrient availability based on your carbon to nitrogen ratio (C:N). This nutrient release will also depend on the length of the growing season, soil temperature and moisture conditions.   

Cover crops are one of the strategies used to improve soil health – another concept we’re seeing farmers focus more on. Your soil’s health is unique to your farm which is why incorporating soil health testing, which assesses the chemical, physical and biological components of soil, is so important in helping you establish a baseline. This test can be used as a roadmap to help manage and improve soil health on your farm and a report card to evaluate the effectiveness of different management practices.