Abstract
Growing a main vegetable crop for harvest and a cover crop for residue return to soil in the same growing season is a promising strategy to sustain soil quality in vegetable rotations. Our research evaluated cover crop strips interseeded between pumpkins ( Cucurbita pepo L . ) as a way to implement such a strategy. Cover crop types were lana vetch ( Vicia villosa ssp. dasycarpa Ten.) and a lana vetch–winter rye ( Secale cereale L.) mix, interseeded before, at the same time, or after pumpkins. The competitive impact of different cover crop strips was assessed using pumpkin yield, cover strip biomass, crop nitrogen status, soil nitrate status, and soil water potential. Cover strips were also assessed for competitiveness with native weeds. Seeding date affected the competitiveness of cover strips with pumpkins, while cover type did not. Cover crops seeded before pumpkins or at the same time reduced pumpkin yield in proportion to biomass produced by the cover strips early in pumpkin growth. Cover strips seeded after pumpkins did not reduce yield. Tilling in a before-seeded cover strip at 30 days after pumpkin seeding gave higher pumpkin yield than before-seeded cover strips that were not tilled. At three of four sites, after-seeded cover strips had the lowest percent weed biomass in strips, and at two sites with moderate weed pressure vetch–rye strips were more effective than vetch alone in suppressing weeds. Cover strips seeded before or at the same time as pumpkins reduced pumpkin yield by taking up resources that were otherwise available to pumpkins. At a high-rainfall site, competition for soil nitrate by cover crop strips was the dominant factor in reducing pumpkin yield. At a low-rainfall site, the dominant factor was competition for water. Because of effective weed suppression and lack of pumpkin yield reduction, interseeding vetch–rye strips after pumpkins was a promising practice, as was tilling in preexistent cover strips at an interval <30 days after pumpkin seeding. Good previous weed management and rye–vetch mixes at high seeding rates are necessary to allow interseeded cover strips to outcompete weeds.
Abstract from the paper’s OpenAlex record, shown for indexing and research. Copyright remains with the authors or the publisher. Read at the source ↗
The text the model read, with the source record’s inline markup (italics, sub- and superscripts) rendered and its character entities decoded; quote offsets refer to the raw text.
Claims 9
Claim · model-written summary
Cover crops seeded before or at the same time as pumpkins reduced pumpkin yield in proportion to early cover-strip biomass.
- Treatment
- Cover crops seeded before pumpkins or at the same timee0
- Outcome
- pumpkin yielde0
- Direction
- reducede0
- Qualifier
- in proportion to biomass produced by the cover strips early in pumpkin growthe0
CucurbitaNot reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
t0“Pumpkins”
e0“Cover crops seeded before pumpkins or at the same time reduced pumpkin yield in proportion to biomass produced by the cover strips early in pumpkin growth”
Claim · model-written summary
Cover strips seeded after pumpkins did not reduce pumpkin yield.
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
t0“Pumpkins”
e1“Cover strips seeded after pumpkins did not reduce yield”
Claim · model-written summary
Seeding date affected the competitiveness of cover strips with pumpkins.
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
t0“Pumpkins”
e2“Seeding date affected the competitiveness of cover strips with pumpkins, while cover type did not”
Claim · model-written summary
Cover type did not affect the competitiveness of cover strips with pumpkins.
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
t0“Pumpkins”
e2“Seeding date affected the competitiveness of cover strips with pumpkins, while cover type did not”
Claim · model-written summary
Tilling a before-seeded cover strip at 30 days after pumpkin seeding gave higher pumpkin yield than untilled before-seeded strips.
- Treatment
- Tilling in a before-seeded cover strip at 30 days after pumpkin seedinge3
- Outcome
- pumpkin yielde3
- Direction
- highere3
- Comparator
- before-seeded cover strips that were not tillede3
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
t0“Pumpkins”
e3“Tilling in a before-seeded cover strip at 30 days after pumpkin seeding gave higher pumpkin yield than before-seeded cover strips that were not tilled”
Claim · model-written summary
At three of four sites, after-seeded cover strips had the lowest percent weed biomass.
- Treatment
- after-seeded cover stripse4
- Outcome
- percent weed biomass in stripse4
- Direction
- loweste4
- Setting
- three of four sitese4
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
t0“Pumpkins”
e4“At three of four sites, after-seeded cover strips had the lowest percent weed biomass in strips”
Claim · model-written summary
At two sites with moderate weed pressure, vetch–rye strips were more effective than vetch alone in suppressing weeds.
- Treatment
- vetch–rye stripse5
- Outcome
- suppressing weedse5
- Direction
- more effectivee5
- Comparator
- vetch alonee5
- Setting
- two sites with moderate weed pressuree5
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
t0“Pumpkins”
e5“at two sites with moderate weed pressure vetch–rye strips were more effective than vetch alone in suppressing weeds”
Claim · model-written summary
At a high-rainfall site, competition for soil nitrate by cover crop strips was the dominant factor in reducing pumpkin yield.
- Treatment
- competition for soil nitrate by cover crop stripse6
- Outcome
- pumpkin yielde6
- Direction
- dominant factore6
- Setting
- a high-rainfall sitee6
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
t0“Pumpkins”
e6“At a high-rainfall site, competition for soil nitrate by cover crop strips was the dominant factor in reducing pumpkin yield”
Claim · model-written summary
At a low-rainfall site, competition for water was the dominant factor limiting pumpkin yield.
- Treatment
- competition for watere7
- Outcome
- pumpkin yielde6
- Direction
- dominant factore7
- Setting
- a low-rainfall sitee7
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
t0“Pumpkins”
e6“At a high-rainfall site, competition for soil nitrate by cover crop strips was the dominant factor in reducing pumpkin yield”
e7“At a low-rainfall site, the dominant factor was competition for water”
The same questions in other papers
cover crop · yield · Cucurbita (pumpkins)Positive and negative results
1 paper in the same direction as this paper · 3 in the opposite direction
- positive
- positive
- positive
1 paper more in this group
See all 5 papers →tillage · yield · Cucurbita (pumpkins)Positive and negative results
7 papers in the same direction as this paper · 5 in the opposite direction · 1 reporting no difference from an alternative
- negative
- no effect
- negative
10 papers more in this group
See all 14 papers →Claims are grouped by organism, treatment and what was measured or targeted. A paper counts as positive when any of its claims in the group is positive.