Cover Crop / Cool season
Annual Ryegrass Cover Crop
Fast cover for open beds after summer vegetables.
Grown for soil cover and roots, not harvest.
Seed spacing and maturity
- Days to maturity
- 60
- Germination temperature
- 45-75F
- Seed depth
- 0.25 inches
- Spacing
- 1 inches
- Row spacing
- 6 inches
- Start method
- Direct sow
Frost-date timing
- Direct sow
- 28 days before last frost
- Fall planting
- 8 weeks before first frost
Action plan
- Can I plant this now?
- Use your local last-frost, first-frost, and soil-temperature checks before treating this crop as plantable today.
- Start indoors or direct sow?
- Direct sow into the final bed when the soil temperature, seed depth, and moisture are ready.
- How much space?
- 1 inches in-row spacing, 6 inches between rows, and 0.25 inch seed depth.
- Best companions?
- Use crop-family rotation first, then pair with compatible timing, spacing, and canopy size rather than relying on a simple companion chart.
- Common failure modes?
- Terminate before seed set to avoid volunteer grass. Moisture during establishment helps quick ground cover. Adaptable to average garden soil with good seed-soil contact.
Growing profile
- Sun
- Full sun
- Water
- Moisture during establishment helps quick ground cover.
- Soil
- Adaptable to average garden soil with good seed-soil contact.
- Watch
- Terminate before seed set to avoid volunteer grass.
- cover-crop
- grass
- soil-cover
- cool-season
Browse context
- Cover Crop Catalog Category collection
- Grass Family Rotation and family context
- Cool Season Seeds Season collection
- Direct Sow Seeds Start-method collection
- Beginner-Friendly Seeds Practical trait collection
- Quick-Maturity Seeds Practical trait collection
- Fall-Planting Seeds Practical trait collection
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