Hello all,
i have a mediterranean climate (Zone 9a, so i do get frost), and i currently
mulch all my beds heavily with
hay,
because loss to evaporation during the summer is crazy here (High clay content in soil, so capilry effects pull moisture to the surface).
I am on a slope and during the winter i have strong down downpours (which washed my woodchips away last winter) and also heavy wind
tens to blow stuff away/break plants.
Now as the summer season approaches its end, i have to put something into the beds to keep it all together and
pump some exudates into the soil.
As i already mentioned, I mulch a lot, so direct seeding may work with some legumes, but i feel safer starting those as transplants.
Now transplants are a lot of work compared to direct seeding, so the less transplants i need for a bed, the better.
Ideal characteristics would be:
- requires large spacing in between (so less work to fill a bed)
- grows/photosynthezizes during the winter ( we do get some sunny days with up to 20C°/68F° , but on most days it's cooler)
- can be terminated easily (ideally by cutting the stem) around March/April
- grows a lot of biomass
- provide a usable crop (tough this is low priority for me)
- They are not in the family of Brassica or Amaranthaceae (because of crop roation)
What comes to my mind are plants like : Buckwhat, Rye, Barley, Fava beans, Peas. I still lack
experience, this is my 2nd year grwoing annuals, and so far i am not very successful, so i ask you for help.
To keep this more formal, it would be really cool if we could put the anwers in table like this one:
| Plant name | Spacing (in cm) | Winter Activity (0 = doesn't grow; 10 = grows excellent) | Termination | biomass production (0 = almost none; 10= a lot) | Usable Crop? |
|---|
| | | | | |
I will update this first post with your answers, so that at the end we hopefully have a good overview of plants that are suitable to be used as transplanted cover crops for mild winter regions.
