Risks to consider with diverse crops or pastures
Goals and expectations
Thinking that diversity is a magic bullet and therefore not implementing good agronomic management (the power of diversity has limits)
Wasting money - make sure the benefits outweigh the costs of seed, time, machinery use etc.
Yield of diverse forage crops being lower than what you need
Potential soil and plant issues
Allelopathy (suppressing other plants)
Crop management impact
Introducing ‘weedy’ crop plants
Too many species mature before planned grazing, resulting in loss of feed quality and animal performance
Contaminating arable seed crops; if you are in a seed producing area please discuss your cover crop species with local seed growers and/or the Foundation for Arable Research (far.org.nz)
Hosting crop diseases
Schematic showing how allelopathy impacts other plants.