Historically Underserved Specialty Crop Farmer Demonstration of Scale Appropriate Winter Cover Crop Rolling/crimping Technologies for Improved Soil Health

Killing a cover crop can provide a mulch on the soil surface, helping retain soil moisture and making soils more resilient to drought conditions. Farmers can kill Cover Crops using herbicides, but they can also kill them by “rolling and crimping” the plants. However, most “roller/crimper” implements are designed for medium to larger scale farmers. Furthermore, many beginning farmers and limited resource farmers lack capital for simple machinery. Many such farmers may only own hand tools and/or simple garden tillers. The lack of access to appropriate technology to enhance soil health will be addressed by demonstrating and transferring innovative, scaled down cover crop crimping alternatives such as foot powered crimpers, and providing a blueprint for the on-farm construction of this technology. This project may have wide-spread application to promote adoption of cover cropping on small-scale specialty crop operations.