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What’s That Mystery Molino Crop With The Yellow Flowers?
November 4, 2024
We received a lot of emails over the past few days asking about the unique yellow-flowering crop planted at Highway 29 and Highway 97 behind the Tom Thumb in Molino.
The plant is called Sunn Hemp (that’s Crotalaria juncea L for the scientific types).
It is a semi-tropical plant that is grown as a cover crop in the southeast. It’s a legume, growing in a variety of locations and returning nitrogen to the soil. It can also be used as a biomass to produce biofuels.
According to the USDA, sunn hemp can produce over 5,000 pounds of biomass and 100 pounds of nitrogen per acre. It can produce this amount within 60 to 90 days, so it has the potential to build organic matter levels and sequester carbon in the soil. It is known to suppress nematodes.
Pictured: Sun hemp Sunday afternoon at Highway 29 and Highway 97 in Molino. NorthEscambia.com photos, click to enlarge
Comments
9 Responses to “What’s That Mystery Molino Crop With The Yellow Flowers?”
Good to know. I recently saw it growing up in the Chumuckla/Jay and wondered what it was as well. Sure makes a pretty field.
We planted this in our food plots on the hunting club to build up the land it worked good
It is also quite pretty. Thanks for not using chemicals.
Thank you. I had driven by and taken pictures and even posted on FB looking for answers.
Would love to set out about 6 Bee hives there!
Very effective very smart farmer
Thank you for sharing. Be on the lookout for deer. They devour this crop and will walk quite a distance to consume. Goats, as well, enjoy, but I don’t see many free ranging as deer.
Thats good news because we often rely heavily on synthetic fertilizers and pesticides in the fields of food we grow which depletes the soil’s organic matter content.
I was wondering what that is. Thank you
It certainly is beautiful.