What Is the Difference Between Hay Seed & Ray Grass Seed?

Hay Seed

• Farmers may cut hay from fields of naturally occurring native forage, but it is more common for them to choose one or more species of grass or legume and to plant seeds of those species in the field after plowing and preparing it. Once these seeds are established, the resulting hay is more uniform, with predictable productivity and nutrient levels. Common hay seed varieties include alfalfa, orchard grass, timothy, fescue, bermudagrass and lespedeza.

Rye Grass Seed

• Ray grass is an obsolete term for ryegrass, a collection of 12 species from the genus Lolium. Of those 12 species, only Italian ryegrass and perennial ryegrass are commonly found in the United States. Ryegrass can be either perennial or annual, and it does best in moist, cool areas without extreme winter and summer temperature swings; notably the northeast and Pacific northwest. Annual ryegrass seeds itself aggressively and may form natural stands that persist for years.

Uses

• Hay seed is, by definition, any seed used to grow plants that will be harvested as hay. Ryegrass seed, on the other hand, has multiple uses. It is a common choice for grass sports fields, especially in the south, where it tends to stay green throughout the winter months. Some homeowners also take advantage of this characteristic by using it as a winter lawn grass. It is also useful for preventing erosion on construction sites since it establishes quickly.

Ryegrass as Hay

• Some varieties of ryegrass may be used as hay, making them a type of hay seed. Ryegrass is not as productive as other cool-season hay grasses such as orchardgrass and timothy, so it is usually sown in combination with a legume such as alfalfa to increase the total harvest per acre. Ryegrass chosen for hay should be a tetraploid variety, meaning that each plant cell contains four copies of every chromosome instead of two (diploid). Tetraploid ryegrass grows larger leaves and has higher sugar content than diploid ryegrass.