The benefits of cover crops are becoming well known, but researchers also want to know more about the long term impacts of cover crops on corn and soybean yields.

Based on an interview with John Sawyer, professor of agronomy at Iowa State University, this article provides an overview of what one research study is finding. Lynn Laws is a communications specialist for Iowa State University and for the USDA-NIFA Sustainable Corn Project.

This resource is part of the USDA-NIFA funded project for climate and agriculture that gathered data from 35 field sites and thousands of farmers in 9 Midwestern states, with the goal of creating a suite of practices for corn-based systems.