Core Ideas Harvesting 71% of corn residue can increase wind erosion potential of a sandy loam soil. Corn residue harvest did not affect soil fertility and corn yields. Aerially interseeded winter rye cover crop tended to reduce wind erosion potential. Residue harvest can increase erosion potential but interseeded cover crop could partly offset this effect. Corn (Zea mays L.) residue is a forage source and a biofuel feedstock. Excessive residue harvest may, however, result in increased soil erosion risks and degraded soil properties. Aerial interseeding of a cover crop (CC) before harvesting corn may offset adverse effects of residue harvest. We studied the impacts of harvesting 71% of corn residue with and without aerially interseeded winter rye (Secale cereale L.) CC on wind and water erosion potential, soil organic carbon (SOC), nutrients, soil water content, and corn yields in a farmer's field under irrigated strip till continuous corn on a sandy loam in the western Corn Belt from 2013 to 2016. Interseeded CC biomass yield ranged from 0.2 to 3.4 Mg ha−1. Corn residue harvest reduced geometric mean diameter of dry soil aggregates and increased wind erodible fraction (<0.84 mm aggregates) by 0, 27, and 37% in the first, second, and third year, respectively, indicating that residue harvest increased the soil's susceptibility to wind erosion. Cover crop had no effect on geometric mean diameter and erodible fraction. Residue harvest reduced near‐surface water content but CC had no effect. Treatments did not affect fertility properties and corn yield. In spring, surface cover was 24.7% in residue‐harvested plots without CC and 65.3% in residue‐harvested plots with CC, indicating that CC provided soil protective cover. Overall. interseeded grass CC may not rapidly improve soil properties, but the added soil cover provided by the interseeded CC could partly offset the effect of residue harvest on wind erosion potential in sandy loam soils.

Large-scale crop residue removal may negatively affect soil water dynamics. Integrating cover crop (CC) with crop residue management can be a strategy to offset potential adverse effects of residue removal. We studied: (i) the impact of corn (Zea mays L.) residue removal (56%) with and without the use of winter rye (Secale cereale L.) CC on soil hydraulic properties, (ii) whether CC would ameliorate residue removal effects on hydraulic properties, and (iii) relationships of hydraulic properties with soil organic C (SOC) and other properties under irrigated no-till continuous corn on a silt loam in south central Nebraska after 5 and 6 yr of management. Cover crops did not affect soil hydraulic properties. However, residue removal reduced cumulative water infiltration by about 45% in one year. Across years, residue removal reduced plant available water (PAW) by 32% and mean weight diameter of water-stable aggregates (MWD) by 23% for the upper 5-cm soil depth. Under no CC, residue removal reduced SOC concentration by 25% in the 0-to 5-cm and by 11% in the 5-to 10-cm depths. Under residue removal, CC increased SOC concentration by 18% in the 0-to 5-cm and by 8% in the 5 to 10-cm depths. Cover crop did not completely offset the residue removal-induced decrease in SOC concentration in the upper 5-cm depth. Plant available water decreased as SOC concentration and MWD decreased. After 6 yr, corn residue removal adversely affected soil hydraulic properties and SOC concentration, but CC was unable to fully offset such adverse impacts. Abbreviations: CC, cover crop; MWD, mean weight diameter of water-stable aggregates, PAW, plant available water, SOC, soil organic C. P roper management of soil and water resources is critical to sustain agricultural production under fluctuating climatic conditions, which include changes in precipitation patterns, heat waves, droughts, and others. In the central Great Plains, management of soil water resources is of special interest because precipitation is often supplemented with irrigation to meet crop production goals (USDA, 2013). Improved agronomic management strategies are needed to address the above concerns (Wienhold et al., 2018). Practices such as CC and crop residue management that maintain or increase surface residue cover can increase precipitation capture, reduce evaporation, and increase water retention capacity. Cover crops can impact soil water management decisions (Unger and Vigil, 1998; Daigh et al., 2014; Basche et al., 2016a). In water-limited regions, CC could reduce PAW needed for main crop production (Nielsen et al., 2016; Alvarez et al., 2017). However, CC may be able to also contribute to water storage by increasing water infiltration, retention, and PAW in the long term. Improved management of CC may ameliorate the negative impacts of precipitation fluctuations (

Corn residue removal reduces soil thermal conductivity and volumetric heat capacity. Cover crops do not mitigate corn residue removal effects on thermal properties. Soil water content and soil bulk density are strong predictors of soil thermal properties. Soil thermal properties govern the transport and storage of heat in the soil. How management practices such as crop residue removal and cover crop (CC) use affect these soil properties is not well understood. For example, CCs could provide physical cover and improve soil properties after main crop residue removal and thus ameliorate the negative effects of residue removal on soil thermal properties. We measured changes in soil thermal properties including soil thermal conductivity, thermal diffusivity, volumetric heat capacity, and related properties under corn (Zea mays L.) residue removal with and without winter cereal rye (Secale cereale L.) under a 6‐yr irrigated no‐till continuous corn experiment on a silt loam in south central Nebraska. Cover crops did not affect thermal properties, but corn residue removal reduced field thermal conductivity by 12 to 41% and volumetric heat capacity by 6 to 49% during the growing season for the 0‐ to 5‐cm depth. Residue removal also reduced laboratory thermal conductivity by 19% at –0.03‐MPa and by 28% at –1.5‐MPa matric potential. Residue removal also reduced volumetric heat capacity in the laboratory by 23% at both matric potentials in the 0‐ to 10‐cm depth. Neither residue removal nor CC affected thermal diffusivity. Thermal conductivity was more strongly correlated with soil water content than with bulk density and soil organic C. Overall, CC had no effect on thermal properties, but corn residue removal could reduce the soil's ability to conduct heat relative to no removal.

Fire is widely recognized as a critical ecological and evolutionary driver that needs to be at the forefront of land management actions if conservation targets are to be met. However, the prevailing view is that prescribed fire is riskier than other land management techniques. Perceived risks associated with the application of fire limits its use and reduces agency support for prescribed burning in the private sector. As a result, considerably less cost-share support is given for prescribed fire compared to mechanical techniques. This study tests the general perception that fire is a riskier technique relative to other land management options. Due to the lack of data available to directly test this notion, we use a combination of approaches including 1) a comparison of fatalities resulting from different occupations that are proxies for techniques employed in land management, 2) a comparison of fatalities resulting from wildland fire versus prescribed fire, and 3) an exploration of causal factors responsible for wildland fire-related fatalities. This approach establishes a first approximation of the relative risk of fatality to private citizens using prescribed fire compared to other management techniques that are readily used in ecosystem management. Our data do not support using risks of landowner fatalities as justification for the use of alternative land management techniques, such as mechanical (machine-related) equipment, over prescribed fire. Vehicles and heavy machinery are consistently leading reasons for fatalities within occupations selected as proxies for management techniques employed by ranchers and agricultural producers, and also constitute a large proportion of fatalities among firefighters. Our study provides the foundation for agencies to establish data-driven decisions regarding the degree of support they provide for prescribed burning on private lands.