%0 Journal Article %A C. Schnarr %A M. Schipanski %A J. Tatarko %T Crop residue cover dynamics for wind erosion control in a dryland, no-till system %D 2022 %R 10.2489/jswc.2022.00005 %J Journal of Soil and Water Conservation %P 221-229 %V 77 %N 3 %X Among the benefits of crop residues is their influence on reducing soil wind erosion. Residue height, diameter, and soil surface cover influence wind speeds and soil susceptibility to wind erosion events. Understanding the role of crop residue type in maximizing residue coverage through time can inform management for improved residue retention, and wind erosion models for better simulation of the residue decomposition process. We used the Dryland Agroecosystem Project (DAP), a long-term, dryland, no-till systems experiment at multiple locations in eastern Colorado, to examine differences between winter annual grain and summer annual forage crop residue dynamics. The DAP utilizes wheat-based rotations plus continuously cropped grain-forage and forage-only rotations. For this study, we focused on residue dynamics of winter wheat (Triticum aestivum) and forage crop (Sorghum bicolor and Setaria italica) residues at two locations in eastern Colorado and following two harvest seasons (2014 and 2015). Decomposition days (DD), a calculation that factors in temperature and rainfall to estimate cumulative conditions that favor decomposition, were used to normalize climate conditions across sites and years. Counts of postharvest standing stems, stem diameters, and residue heights were measured, as was soil surface coverage. Soil cover measurements were used to estimate the length of time before soil surface cover fell below a 30% coverage threshold and to model residue persistence. Results showed that winter wheat consistently produced more residue cover immediately after harvest, and cover also persisted almost twice as long as forage crop residues. The hypothesis that residue cover could be represented using an exponential decay model was supported for forage sorghum and forage millet, while wheat residue maintained postharvest coverage of the soil for a period of time before beginning to decline and followed a quadratic decay model. The combined effects of standing stem density, initial residue cover, and coverage longevity point to wheat being a valuable protector against wind erosion in these systems. The different residue trajectories by crop type suggest that shifts in crop rotations within no-till management systems can have important implications for wind erosion control in the semiarid Great Plains. %U https://www.jswconline.org/content/jswc/77/3/221.full.pdf