Cereal Rye

[duajones]

I noticed RKN in my small cuke bed this summer and decided to plant cereal rye in that bed as well as others as a fall cover crop. Its growing nicely and is probably 8-10 inches tall already. Those of you that have grown it, do you mow it like you would regular grass? Or just let it grow until spring, kill it and work it into the soil.

[dice]

I would guess that you just want it to stay succulent
to hold down the carbon-nitrogen ratio in the mowed
plant residue, unless you are mixing it with a legume
(like hairy vetch or clover or field peas) to supply extra
nitrogen and want the rye to provide a structural support
for the legume (in which case you might hold off
mowing it until it flowers):

This page says cut it at "12-18 inches":

http://www.uvm.edu/vtvegandberry/fac...winterrye.html

In your Gulf Coast climate, it probably is not critical
whether you mow it now or not. If you do, odds are
it still grows plenty over the winter, just like it does
in spring and summer for people in climates farther
north who mow it before it flowers. (Winter Rye
has been kept alive for 7 years by letting it grow
and then consistently mowing it before it flowers.)

You need to let it flower in spring if you want mowing
to kill it. Shallow-tilling mowed winter rye that has not
flowered will not work, it will keep coming back. Then
one ends up needing more drastic measures, like covering
it with black plastic for weeks or using a herbicide like
Scythe (pelargonic acid) to kill it that only works on foliage
and won't have any herbicidal effect in soil (thus not
affecting subsequent seeded or transplanted crops
there).

Winter Rye flowers when the day length gets to 14 hours,
so you can watch the sunrise-sunset difference in your
weather report to know when to give it the "fatal last
mowing". (This could be a big hassle around the equator,
where the days never get that long.) You might get
a few late-flowering individual clumps that survive
because they haven't actually flowered yet that
need to be forked out of there.

[duajones]

Good info, thanks so much

[dice]

"Good info, thanks so much."

De nada.

Farmers in the valleys up here on the west
side of the Cascades have said that they can
get 3 crops of hay in a year with a mild
winter. I bet you could do that with cereal
rye every winter down there.

If you just let it grow all winter, it will be huge
by spring, and you may need a shredder.

[Worth1]

If you let it go to seed you can cut it and harvest the grain.
Then use the straw for mulch.

http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/...ting_grain.htm

Looks like a lot of work.

Worth

[creister]

I have used cereal rye alone or mixed with wheat as part of a cover crop planting for going on 4 years. I always just cut it with the weed eater about a week before I need to plant out. I then put a thick layer of shredded leaf mulch over it. I have never had a problem with it growing back. Some plants had seed heads, others don't. By September, when I reach under the leaf mulch, I can't find any trace of the previous winter's cover crop. I don't till, strictly no till. Good luck.

[Ruth_10]

We used cereal rye for a winter cover crop for many years in Michigan. We did not mow it. In the spring we tilled it under when it was about a foot tall. Occasionally one would pop back up if it wasn't completely tilled in, but rye is extremely easy to pull and it doesn't grow back from the roots like a grass would. I think the only reason you would want to mow is if it started getting so high it would be difficult to till in.

If I were you, I'd till it in now, wait a week or so, and plant it again for a second cover crop to till in in another month or so.

[dice]

(Quoting myself)

Winter Rye flowers when the day length gets to 14 hours,
so you can watch the sunrise-sunset difference in your
weather report to know when to give it the "fatal last mowing".

I see that the day length never actually gets to 14 hours
in Corpus Christi, according to

http://www.timeanddate.com/worldcloc...&afl=-11&day=1

So I guess you would have to cut it off short a couple of weeks
before plant out, and then put a thick mulch on it (like 6
inches, more if you have it) to keep the rye from regrowing.
Splice (organic burn-down herbicide) is an option, but it
costs something, of course. The rye itself should provide
a lot of green material for mulch.

Edit:
That should be Scythe, rather than "Splice". There may be
other products as well whose active ingredient is
pelargonic acid.

Day length does not get to 14 hours in Abilene until May,
and I assume that Creister plants out long before then,
so either cereal/winter/field rye cultivars are available
that flower in spring on shorter days or covering the mowed
rye with a thick mulch is effective even if the rye has not
flowered yet.

[creister]

Dice, you are correct that I plant out earlier than May. I just cut the rye/legume mix as low as possible and then cover it with about 3-4 inches of shredded leaves. I have never had a problem with it growing back.