Soil + Water: Conservation Conversations

Cover Crops with Jay Furseth - Soil and Water Conservation

Yahara WINS Season 1 Episode 4

Jay Furseth of Furseth Farms, and member of the Biological Farming Friends farmer-led watershed group, shares his experience using  cover crops on his family's dairy and grain farm near Stoughton WI.  The Furseth's have been planting cover crops for over a decade, starting with oats after corn silage harvest.  They've since moved on to planting cover crops within their soybean and corn grain rotation, have tried out various seeding methods, planting green, and most recently installed a seeder on their vertical tillage equipment.

Local resources for cover crops:

University of Wisconsin-Madison, Integrated Pest and Crop Management 

  • cover crop publications: https://ipcm.wisc.edu/covercrops/
  • youtube cover crop playlist: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-xKu-Wp3-hg&list=PLMF9p1QYShgxlSdUzfnPJFd1l8J90tCpr

University of Wisconsin-Madison, Crops and Soils, Division of Extension cover crop resources: https://ipcm.wisc.edu/covercrops/

Season 1 - Soil + Water Conservation Conversations
Hosted by Kim Meyer, former agronomist and watershed program coordinator with Yahara WINS, this season of podcasts connects you to farmers and other experts on the topic of water quality. You will hear from farmers that are utilizing conservation practices on their farms in southern Wisconsin. You’ll learn about the farm, the farmer, the conservation practice that they have successfully implemented on their farm, as well as the challenges they’ve faced and how they have overcome these challenges. Beyond feeding our world, clean water is one of the many ecosystem services agriculture can provide. Agriculture is not the problem, rather, it is the solution to protecting and improving our local water quality. Learn more about Yahara WINS at www.yaharawins.org.