Grain · Poaceae
When to plant barley
The fastest of the common grains to ripen and the most tolerant of poor and salty ground, which is why it grows further north than wheat.
Sow direct
3 weeks before
Counted from your last spring frost.
Days to maturity
90-120
From sowing to a first picking.
Frost tolerance
Hardy
How much cold the plant itself will take.
Those weeks become real dates once you name a place.
Timing, in frost-relative terms
Seed packets rarely give calendar dates, because a date that suits one latitude is wrong at another. They give offsets from the last spring frost instead, and those offsets are what make barley plantable anywhere.
- Sow direct 3 weeks before the last frost.
- Expect 90–120 days to maturity, counted from sowing.
- Can also be sown in late summer for an autumn crop.
Getting the timing right
Sow in early spring as soon as the ground is workable. Barley ripens two to three weeks ahead of wheat, which makes it the grain of choice where the season is short.
Frost tolerance
Seedlings tolerate about -8C. The short season means it usually finishes before the first autumn frost even in cold regions.
Classified as hardy, with damage expected below -8°C (17.6°F)17.6°F (-8°C).