On September 5, 2024 NEW Water hosted a field day in Ashwaubenon Creek and Dutchman Creek (ACDC), with Lower Fox Demonstration Farms and watershed partners, to showcase new advancements in cover crop planting, drone seeding. Drone seeding is an innovative agricultural technique that employs drones to distribute seeds over fields. This method is particularly effective for planting cover crops, which winter rye and red clover seeds were used in a standing corn crop, before the main crop is harvested.
Learn more about drone seeding here >>
The corn crop was expected to be harvested roughly 10 days after spreading the cover crop seed. The hope is to give cover crop seeds a head start germinating and then after the crop is harvested, the cover crop can take advantage of the sunlight and grow quickly establishing itself and protecting the soil from run off during fall and early winter precipitation events.
The drone operators paused their work to address questions from the farmers and explain more about the drone logistics and specifications. After the field demonstration, farmers and staff were encouraged to meet at the Soil Health Education and Demonstration (SHED) building for additional discussion about resources on conservation practices to consider for their farms.
Learn more about conservation practices here >>
About 35 attended the event. Since the field day, several farmers have indicated plans to do drone seeding and/or spraying on their own fields. Thank you everyone who joined us for a field day to learn about drone seeding!