LEXINGTON, Ill. — Researchers are helping Midwest farmers explore what crops they might add to a traditional corn-soybean rotation. Pennycress is being studied for its potential to grow as a cash crop between soybeans and corn.
Illinois State University crop scientist and researcher Nicholas Heller showed farmers on tour at ISU’s University Farm in Lexington Aug. 15 some things learned, so far, about growing pennycress here.
This research is just part of the 440-acre crop and livestock farm in Lexington that welcomes about 3,000 visitors a year and helps educate 420 ISU ag students annually, said ISU agricultural professor Rob Rhykerd on the field day sponsored by the Illinois Soybean Association.
One plot, featuring a pennycress oilseed production system, has a grain corn, golden pennycress and soybean rotation. Pennycress was harvested in early June this year and soybeans were planted on June 7. No chemicals were applied. The soybeans are maturing, but have a good stand of weeds.
That planting date is much later than April 12, when the earliest soybeans were planted here.
Pennycress does well when planted in mid-September so the winter annual can establish and bolt in the spring, ready for a late May or early June harvest, Heller said.
So far when pennycress is planted after corn, it doesn’t fare as well after soybeans. The later planting date and heavy residue hinder the crop. Pennycress has a better stand after soybeans when the tiny seed can be planted earlier, he said.
The pennycress here is grown in conjunction with CoverCress, a Missouri-based company that is part of a multi-state project commercializing the crop. The company decides on April 1 if a pennycress field is worth harvesting. If the stand isn’t good enough, it could be terminated to plant soybeans, Heller said.
“CoverCress has a whole strategy across the chain. They provide the seed and buy it back,” Heller said.
It costs the farmer nothing for CoverCress seed. In contrast, planting cereal rye as a cover crop might cost between $12 and $15 per acre.
“CoverCress contracts growers for seed,” he said.
The company is finding markets and processing for biodiesel. Making aviation fuel is the goal, along with eventually growing the crop for meal to feed livestock, Heller said.
“CoverCress estimates the value of the crop will be $250/acre,” Heller said.
However, so far the crop is making $50 to $100/acre. He said farmers aren’t likely to want to grow pennycress for $50/acre if it means planting $14/bu. soybeans almost two months late.
“But if it (CoverCress) gets up to $200/acre it might be interesting,” he said.
In the St. Louis area, farmers were able to harvest pennycress earlier than in central Illinois and planted soybeans from May 18 to May 25 this year, which makes a big difference for the double crop, he said.
McLean County, in central Illinois, is on the edge of areas CoverCress is focusing its attention, he said.
Some farmers have shied away from growing pennycress because of its legacy as a weed. Last year at a field day at Western Illinois University in Macomb, a Warren County farmer said one of his neighbors had grown sunflowers in the past, which became a nuisance to his neighbors. He didn’t want to grow pennycress if it might cause weed problems for neighbors.
The undesirable traits of pennycress, the weed, continue to be bred out of the commercial CoverCress plants, said John Sedbrook, an ISU genetics professor who has been active in pennycress research for several years.
“We now have many lines of evidence showing that the golden seed trait in CoverCress abolishes the weediness of wild pennycress,” said Sedbrook, a member of the Integrated Pennycress Research Enabling Farm and Energy Resilience team working to commercialize pennycress.
Win Phippen, Western Illinois University plant breeder and IPREFER leader, found that golden pennycress seeds that are buried outside in soil do not persist past a few months due to degrading/rotting, Sedbrook said. Moreover, at multiple field locations where the wild dark- seeded pennycress was planted next to golden seed varieties, the following season the vast majority of plants that re-emerged were wild dark-seeded pennycress.
“Very few, and in many cases, no golden pennycress was found to grow the following season at different Midwest locations,” Sedbrook said.
While Phippen has been researching pennycress for more than a dozen years, the IPREFER project started five years ago with a $10 million USDA grant and combines efforts of IWU, ISU, the University of Minnesota and CoverCress in developing the new cash cover crop for the Midwest.
The researchers are encouraging farmers to start slow with the new crop. It’s not something to plant on 1,000 acres, Heller told the visiting soybean growers.
“It’s more for 100 acres — on that last field you would plant,” he said.
“We are making steady progress in the breeding and traits development programs,” Sedbrook said. “Year over year, CoverCress elite germplasm has been demonstrating higher yields. My lab has been making good progress in identifying genetic changes that reduce seed glucose content as well as increase seed size.”
