Forage rape is a tasty winter fodder for cattle. It offers very good green matter and dry matter yields with high a protein content. As green manure, the organic matter helps humus formation and promotes optimal soil quality. A high capacity to bind nutrients makes both winter and summer forage rape an excellent species for water protection. The network of fine roots covers large areas of soil, stabilising soil structure and promoting air exchange within the soil.

As a winter-hardy green manure for erosion protection and nitrate binding with dense root penetration and a high potential for nitrate return to the subsequent crop. It can be cut or grazed off.

Marrow stem kale deliver a high dry mass yield for forage use. Because Marrow stem kale is winter hardy, it is used for grazing areas for wild animals.

As a fast-growing cover crop after the cereal harvest, luscious crops form just 6-8 weeks after the preceding crop is harvested. It can be used as fresh fodder or ensilaged and used in biogas plants. The dense roots provide additional organic matter to improve humus and stabilise the soil’s structure.

This traditional plant for oil production is also excellently suited to growing as a cover crop. Oil flax is a perfect neutral plant in cover crop blends.

As an undemanding small-grain legume, clover is often used as a cover crop. In cover crop blends, the other plants benefit from clover’s nitrogen production. Clover flowers are also attractive nectar sources for honey production.

Winter-hardy crimson clover is ideal in grassy blends for biomass production. Through symbiosis with rhizo-biaceae, crimson clover delivers additional nitrogen, penetrates the soil densely with its roots and is there-fore an excellent and impactful preceding crop.

The heavily branched root system and the striking flowers, which are an important source of nutrition for wild bees, make common vetch a contributor in freezing-off cover crop blends. Winter vetch is mostly found in winter-hardy biomass blends such as viterra® LUNDSGAARDER GEMENGE and viterra® WICKROGGEN.

With their striking, large radishes, these tillage radishes make more space in the top layers of soil. This encourages air ex-change in the soil and lets more precipitation infiltrate the ground. Nutrients are stored in the radishes over winter, and these are made available to the subsequent crop as they rot over winter.Tillage radish is well suited as a component in cover crop blends.

As a large-grain legume, the blue lupin introduces additional nitrogen into crop rotations when used as a cover crop, as its pronounced taproot penetrates deep layers of the soil.

Common buckwheat (fagopyrum esculentum) is a fast-growing cover crop that freezes off reliably. Thanks to its early flowers and seed ripeness, buckwheat is often used in gameland blends. Because of its early seed ripeness and the difficulty of control, we do not recommend buckwheat for use in sugar beet crop rotations.