- What are the prices of seeds for catch crops?
- Is it possible to compose a catch crop at a favorable price?
How long do seeds for catch crops cost?
Many farmers like to use mustard. It is a relatively cheap catch crop and at the same time builds quite a large biomass. Mustard prices are usually in the range of PLN 4-5/kg.
Phacelia is valued at PLN 10-13/kg, but occasionally you can find cheaper options. You have to pay about PLN 12-14 per kilogram of alfalfa. However, in the case of serradella, you have to take into account costs of up to PLN 15-17/kg, and these are generally the highest offers. There are cheaper quotes, but they are rare and always at a rate of at least PLN 10/kg.
Oil radish costs PLN 4.5-6/kg. In turn, buckwheat appears in various offers at a price level of PLN 3-4/kg. Lupine is valued at PLN 2 – 3.5/kg, and peas are usually around PLN 2/kg. Turnip seed costs about PLN 7-9/kg. We can buy sunflower for about PLN 3/kg.
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A simple and cheap catch crop: radish or mustard
You can also purchase ready-made intercrop mixtures consisting of several plants. Thus, a mixture based on mustard, radish, buckwheat, lupine, clover and phacelia (with the majority of buckwheat and mustard) is valued at PLN 7-8 per kg. the proposed sowing rate is 40 – 50 kg/ha.
In turn, a mixture containing mustard and oil radish (50/50) costs PLN 6-7/kg. The recommended sowing rate is approximately 25 kg/ha.
The mixture based on radish (50%), mustard and phacelia (25% each) is valued at PLN 6.5 – 7.5/kg.
These are just some of the proposals for ready-made mixtures – there are many of them on the market (both ready-made and composed at the customer's request).
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Many farmers sow catch crops contrary to applicable law. Why?
A good cover crop always improves soil fertility
There are many options for composing your own cover crop mixture. The cheapest solutions will not necessarily be the best, although you can easily find solutions that will be relatively economically beneficial and will enrich the soil at the same time. When selecting seeds, it is worth paying attention, first of all, to crop rotation in the position where the cover crop is sown, and at the same time to what goal we want to achieve. Do we want to provide a lot of valuable biomass to the soil or do we rather want to penetrate the soil profile by mowing? Or maybe grain rotation should be interrupted (e.g. wheat – corn – wheat)? A good catch crop is one that achieves appropriate goals in a given location, and these may be slightly different in each field. However, it is always intended to enrich the soil and contribute to the growth of organic matter and thus improve soil fertility.
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