The Rural Voice, 2000-06, Page 22L J M Crop Care
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18 THE RURAL VOICE
that agroforestry may provide a
solution, by allowing farmers to
generate financial benefits in the
short to mid-term.
The Ontario Federation of
Agriculture, in a pamphlet describes
agroforestry as "an approach to land
use that incorporates trees into
farming systems and allows for the
production of trees and crops/animals
from the same piece of land, in order
to obtain economic, environmental
and cultural benefits."
Agroforestry has many
applications, including wind-
break systems, silvopastural
systems where trees and animals are
integrated. intercropping of trees and
plants (e.g., walnuts with wheat,
soybeans and hay), integrated
riparian management systems to
control stream bank erosion, and
forest farming.
Shelter belts and hedge rows have
long been used to modify
microclimates around fields.
Properly designed, they reduce
evapotranspiration from plant and
soil surfaces. They consequently
often result in yield increases relative
to conventional practice, while
occupying around seven per cent of
the land area. The key, according to
Henry Kock of the University of
Guelph, is to design "wind filters"
that don't block the wind, creating
lees, but rather filter it. Deciduous
trees may be better because they
transpire more moisture into the
passing winds than do conifers.
Research at the University of
Guelph on Ontario systems shows
that tree -cereal crop inter cropping
systems can be managed to reduce
competitive interactions and augment
complementary ones, resulting in
economic benefits to farmers.
Nitrogen is transferred to adjacent
crops from tree leaf fall, soil organic
carbon increases by up to 30 per cent
relative to monocultural systems,
nitrate loading to streams is reduced
by half, and earthworm populations
are augmented.
At an agro forestry conference
held in Guelph in 1998, several
examples of farmers' efforts were
reported. A Grand Valley farmer has
planted rows of black walnuts with
corn, grain and hay. As the trees
grow, he sees the tree -hay acreage
becoming pasture for heifers. A