Farmers are investigating whether they can limit ploughing and chemical inputs by growing a permanent living mulch beneath their arable crops.

Through the Innovative Farmers programme, six farms have teamed up with the knowledge exchange team at AHDB and researchers from the Organic Research Centre to co-design a practical trial that assesses the impacts of growing clover as an understory to their usual arable crops.

Both organic and non-organic farmers are taking part in the field lab, as they are keen to learn from each other to help establish organic no-till farming systems or lower inputs to conventional no-till systems. It is hoped the understory will reduce or eliminate chemical fertilisers and herbicides, by controlling weeds whilst also fixing nitrogen.

The trial has also received funding from Organic Arable, which believes that the technique, if proven effective, could be a 'revolutionary' method for organic cereal farmers.

Clive Bailye, partner at TWB Farms in Staffordshire, is a conventional farmer who moved to conservation agriculture 15 years ago. He said: “For me, finding out how we can do organic no till without livestock is like the holy grail of arable farming.

"Environmentally our farm has transformed, and our yields and crop consistency have improved – although we have made lots of changes so it’s not just down to the no-till system. But it has made a big difference and we have cut out insecticide use completely. I’m hoping by using this clover understory to build fertility we will get even more healthy soil biology and we can stop using the fungicides and nitrogen fertiliser," said Mr Bailye.

“The nice thing about this field lab is it’s bringing learnings from both the organic and conventional sides together to cover common goals. Finding that middle ground and sharing knowledge will help us all to find the right solutions. Larger, on-farm trials like this are more realistic because you’re subjected to the impacts that a real farm must deal with. And it’s bringing the farmers and researchers together – knowledge exchange is really important but it’s also key to quantify what you’re doing.”

The new 'living mulch' systems will be compared to each farm’s typical farming practice as a control, and the difference between the two systems will be compared across farms. It is hoped that by using a permanent living mulch, no till farmers can also reduce reliance on glyphosate to make the system work, as it removes any need to terminate temporary cover crops.

Programme manager for Innovative Farmers, Helen Aldis, said: “We know there can be huge benefits to soil, biodiversity and productivity by using both organic and no-till farming approaches, but both come with their own set of challenges. By growing a living mulch, we are hoping it might address key sustainability challenges for all types of farmers in keeping soil disturbance and chemical inputs to a minimum.

"It is crucial that research into sustainable farming solutions is done on real farms so we can see the impacts this approach might have on real farm businesses. With the farmers’ expert knowledge combined with the scientific rigor of the ORC and AHDB researchers, we are excited to see how this group of farmers get on.”

The farmers are under sowing white clover into cereal crops this Spring to establish a long-term living mulch that will then be grazed or mowed hard after harvest and prior to direct drilling of a cash crop in the autumn – or potentially next spring.

Results and updates on the trial will be shared open source on the field lab portal at www.innovativefarmers.org, where any farmer can join the network for free.