Iron and Clay Cowpeas: Heat-Loving Legumes for Summer Growth
Watch a 70-day-old Iron and Clay cowpea plot in South Central Nebraska and learn why these legumes are a versatile warm-season choice. You'll see how their vining habit, drought tolerance, and long growing season make them valuable for grazing mixes, hay, silage, or nitrogen fixation—and why they're a better fit than soybeans if you grow soybeans in rotation.
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0:03 All right. Well, this is one of our cowpea test plots here. So, this plot was established back on June 9th. We're now mid-August. So, we're looking about 70 days of growth here in South Central Nebraska.
0:14 Cowpeas are probably one of our most popular warm season legumes. That's because they're so versatile. They work in forage settings. So if you know, doing a grazing mix or a hay mix or a silage mix, cowpeas work in that.
0:26 If you're trying to do a full season kind of nitrogen fixer, cowpeas work in that. Some people are putting corn in a seed mixes.
0:32 Just a lot of use. In general, cowpeas are extremely
0:36 They love the heat. They're fairly drought tolerant. They're really fast to germinate. This is normally one of the first plots that are up and out of the ground and you get the two little leaves coming out and they're off to the races.
0:45 So, a lot to love about cowpeas. This particular plot is the iron and clay cowpeas. That's a very long season bean. So here or pea, here in Nebraska, these will not really make seed because
0:58 They're so long of season. But a lot of uses. The plot is a little bit smooshed down. We had some wind events here a week ago or so.
1:08 If you gave these beans something to vine up like a sorghum plant, they would
1:12 Be vining upright. Yeah. So, like Nathan said, these things have tendrils and they want to try to climb. You can see that tendril there. That's looking for something to grab and then.
1:35 The top of the canopy. Like Nathan said, these are long season. They're very indeterminate. They're going to just grow vegetatively here in Nebraska and in most of the Midwest and High Plains all summer long.
1:47 Seed production on these, we have to go as far south as Florida and Georgia to really do consistent seed production on this particular variety. Which means it's going to grow vegetatively for a long time.
1:58 Means it's a really good cover crop. These are going to cost a little bit more than soybeans, but the seed size is smaller, so that kind of makes up for it. But if you have soybeans in your rotation, this is not a soybean, and so.
2:11 It's not going to vector the same diseases, the same pests. So, this would be our preferred go-to warm season cover crop for people that do have soybeans in the rotation. So again, probably one of the most popular of all the warm season legumes would be these cowpeas.