In the near future, more no-tillers and strip-tillers than ever before will be able to purchase cutting-edge, cover-crop seeding machines that used to be reserved for field days, research farms and expert welders.

Major names like Hagie Mfg., Salford Equipment and Dawn Equipment are plunging into the cover-crop seeding business, while a mix of grassroots startup companies are also getting involved.

No-Till Farmer editors have assembled the latest, most cutting-edge, cover-crop seeding tools hitting fields this year — many of them featured at the 19th annual Cover Crops Solutions Cover Crop and Soil Health Field Days last fall in Holtwood, Pa.

Three-In-One Cover Crop Seeder Does It All

Four years of research and testing led to the development of the Cover Crop Interseeder and Applicator, a semi-mounted machine that can seed cover crops into standing corn, sidedress nitrogen and apply herbicides in one pass.

The unit was developed by Cory Dillon, Chris Houser, Penn State weed scientist Bill Curran and Penn State agronomist Greg Roth.

Dillon builds and fabricates research machinery at the Penn State University’s Russell Larson Research and Education Center at Rock Springs, Pa., and is working on his masters in agronomy, while Houser works as a Penn State Extension educator and holds a master’s degree in agronomy from the university.

Interseeder Technologies, formed through the team that developed the machine, will be producing units for the ag market this year.

The seeder’s development began 4 years ago, when Penn State agricultural scientists built a prototype of the…