Oats for Compost

Oats

• Oats are a non-legume crop that recycles the nitrogen already in the soil, making it available for the next crop. Legume crops, like clover or soybean, restore nitrogen to the soil as they die off. Oats also help to prevent the leaching of nitrogen and other important soil nutrients like phosphorous and potassium.

Benefits

• In addition to nutrient protection and recycling, oats are a winterkill crop. This means they are planted in the autumn and allowed to die out naturally before being tilled under in spring. Winterkill crops reduce the cost of having to manually kill a crop before a new one can be planted. Over the course of the winter, the oat crop helps keep erosion and weeds at bay and improves soil tilth as the roots break through compacted areas.

Procedure

• Plant the oat cover crop in the fall over the crop acreage that you intend for early spring planting. You may add some hairy vetch or winter peas in with the oat seed, but refrain from diluting the oat seed too severely. Oats may be managed in a similar fashion to winter rye; it may be cut in spring and left on the field to act as a mulch for new seeds or tilled into the soil to improve soil structure and tilth.

Spring Planting

• In the event you want to plant an oat cover crop in the spring, management is similar to the fall planting but without the benefits of the winterkill. Spring planting may also be preferred in areas where winters are too mild to kill the oats. When planting in the spring, the cover crop must be killed, cut and laid over or tilled under in time to plant the following crop. Plant in March in most areas and allow two weeks between cutting the oats and planting the new seed.