Sowed a Cover Crop

[retiredwith4acres]

We sowed buckwheat a week ago in part of the garden we have worked. It popped right up and seems to be doing well. I wanted buckwheat because I have read it is a great cover crop for soil building AND our honeybees will love it when it blooms. I am hoping we can work up a couple more rows when we harvest the sweet potatoes on Friday. Hopefully we can dig, till, and sow before the rain comes in on Friday night. That will put all the garden area other than the turnip patch and the okra which we are still harvesting. The rest we have in raised beds.

 

[journey11]

I planted buckwheat the year before last. It took about 30 days from germination to bloom. Pretty little white blooms too. However, I didn't time mine well and the frost killed it before my bees had much time to work it. If you all have had all the rain this week like we've had, your buckwheat ought to grow pretty quickly.

 

[thistlebloom]

Sure sounds like your garden is doing great Retired! Next year should be super bountiful for you.

I bought buckwheat to sow in the garden patch that I was letting rest this year, but typically, I didn't get to it. :/

I did get a really stupendous weed crop though! And those went to seed before I went after them, so it looks like I'll be having lot of fun in that area for the next few years. But I'm going to plant the buckwheat in the spring. The weeds might as well have a little higher class company.

 

[Smiles Jr.]

Retired - I have used buckwheat for a cover crop. I used it for the same reason you suggested . . . the honey bees. While it seems to be a pretty good cover crop, I have never had any luck with blossoms for the girls. I have planted it in late Sept./early Oct. and the cold weather got to it before it bloomed. In the springtime I always till it under before the blossoms appear.

One year I tried to harvest it and make little bales for the rabbits to eat in January, February, and March but that was too labor intensive and I never tried again. I may try again but the timing of planting, growth, and harvest comes at harvest time for other things and doesn't work out too well around here. Sometimes 24 hr. days just ain't enough. Well, naptime has to fit in there somewhere, too.

 

[digitS']

Planting a fall cover crop is a little tricky around here.

Yes, there are winter wheat fields being planted right now by the 1,000's of acres. However, those wheat plants won't amount to much and might even be hard to till under in the spring. A gardener may have just planted a "weed" for 2013 instead of a cover crop.

That is certainly how the traditional winter rye can turn out. Always be sure that it is annual rye seed that you are buying or you have just sown a lawn in your garden space.

Okay, you have your annual rye or wheat weed. I have found that rye can be waist-high by the end of April IF it is planted by the end of July . . ! Try sowing it here in September and it will be ankle-high by that time . . . I'll take the waist-high stuff and pull it by hand - then, it needs to be buried in the planting beds.

Don't want to tie up your planting beds from the end of July on? That's understandable. You aren't going to get much out of the way except spring greens and peas by that early. Still, you can see how you could do a 3 year rotation with a winter cover crop:

1st Spring: peas or early greens
Summer: winter rye
Fall/Winter: grow on
2nd Spring/Summer: warm-season veggie
Fall/Winter: fallow
3rd Spring: peas or early greens
. . . . .

Another idea is a spring cover crop: peas and something like mustard.

Finally, there is a summer cover crop: something like sunflowers that are chopped and tilled before bolting to seed.

I wish I had more options for a late sowing but I don't really. Only about 10% of Austrian field peas sown late survived our sub-zero winter. A gardener could consider the seed as an "organic fertilizer," I guess.

Steve

 

[hoodat]

Retired - I have used buckwheat for a cover crop. I used it for the same reason you suggested . . . the honey bees. While it seems to be a pretty good cover crop, I have never had any luck with blossoms for the girls. I have planted it in late Sept./early Oct. and the cold weather got to it before it bloomed. In the springtime I always till it under before the blossoms appear.

One year I tried to harvest it and make little bales for the rabbits to eat in January, February, and March but that was too labor intensive and I never tried again. I may try again but the timing of planting, growth, and harvest comes at harvest time for other things and doesn't work out too well around here. Sometimes 24 hr. days just ain't enough. Well, naptime has to fit in there somewhere, too.

Be cautious about using buckwheat as forage for farm animals. It has been found to cause an alergic reaction in some animals (Especially horses) that causes a skin rash. The strange thing is that the rash usually occurs only on the white parts of the animal.