How to Use Green Manure in Crop Rotation for Long-Term Soil Health

 How to Use Green Manure in Crop Rotation for Long-Term Soil Health

Green manure is more powerful when used as part of a crop rotation system. Crop rotation is the practice of planting different crops on the same land in a planned sequence. When green manure crops are added into the rotation, they help restore nutrients, break disease cycles, and improve soil structure.

1. What Is Crop Rotation?

Crop rotation means growing different types of crops in the same field over different seasons or years. For example, you might grow maize this season, beans next season, and green manure in the third season.

This method reduces soil exhaustion, controls pests and diseases, and improves overall farm productivity.

2. How Green Manure Fits into Rotation

Green manure crops can be grown:

* Between two food crop seasons

* Alongside slow-growing crops as cover crops

* As a fallow crop in degraded or idle land

* In strips or intercropped with main crops

Example rotation plan:

Year 1: Maize

Year 2: Beans or cowpea (legume)

Year 3: Green manure (e.g., mucuna or sunhemp)

Year 4: Root crop (e.g., cassava or sweet potato)

This helps build up nitrogen, improve organic matter, and prevent pest cycles.

3. Benefits of Combining Green Manure with Rotation

* Prevents overuse of soil nutrients

* Restores nitrogen naturally without buying urea or DAP

* Breaks cycles of maize and bean diseases like blight and root rot

* Suppresses weeds naturally

* Helps sandy or clay soils become more balanced over time

4. Best Green Manure Crops for Rotation

* Mucuna pruriens: Improves fallow land, adds 150 kg N/ha

* Sunhemp (Crotalaria): Adds 120 kg N/ha, suppresses nematodes

* Lablab: Adds biomass and improves dry soils

* Tithonia diversifolia: Can be used during short rains or as alley crop

* Cowpea: Works well between main crops, fixes nitrogen