"We don't plant the buffer crops," said Mr. Reddy, the Hussainpur farmer.
In the early years this could mean weakened plants, a lack of insect diversity to buffer crops against pests, and plenty of other problems.
Indeed, the sheer variety and complexity of factors make it difficult for farmers to protect crops from raiding, and some attempt to address this by planting buffer crops near the forest boundary, to reduce the economic impact of losing their main cash crop and to reduce the investment required in crop guarding [14], [15], [16].
In addition to locking carbon in the soil, composting buffers crop roots from heat and drought while increasing forage and food-crop yields.
This is possible because (i) humans provide beneficial conditions and aid reproduction, (ii) frequent polyploidy buffers crops from inbreeding problems, and (iii) deleterious mutations were likely purged through past bottlenecks and selection.
Improvements in roads and the large-scale construction of canals allowed food to be transported from areas of plenty to areas of scarcity.These developments meant farmers could often produce reasonable yields during colder weather and even when they could not, long-distance trade provided a buffer against crop failure.
A protester was arrested Sunday morning after attempting to break into a field trial of genetically modified wheat at Rothamsted Research, an agricultural research station in Harpenden, U.K. The attack damaged fences and some of the "buffer zone" crops surrounding the experimental wheat, but damaged "less than 0.1%" of the test crop, says Darren Hughes, head of communications at Rothamsted.
One program within CCRP, CP33, habitat buffers for upland birds, was designed to provide incentives for substituting herbaceous buffers for crop field margins to promote wildlife habitat.
Careful use of fertilizer and irrigation water and the preservation of unplanted land buffers between crops and water bodies can reduce fertilizer pollution, soil erosion and water consumption.
Including the crop buffer distance parameters in the model did not significantly improve the fit compared with a model with total acres within 750 m.
