When Is the Best Time to Sow Early Rice in the South?

Upland rice, also known as dryland rice, is drought-tolerant and suited to dryland cultivation; it is also called upland rice, a general term for cultivated rice varieties able to grow in vast drylands, slopes and arid ecological environments, and it is a variant type of rice. So when is the best time to sow early rice in southern China?

Early rice in southern China is generally sown in early April, transplanted in late April, and harvested around mid-July.

The suitable sowing period for early rice is when the daily average temperature stays above 12 degrees Celsius for 3 consecutive days; in the Yangtze River basin, the suitable sowing period is from late March to early April. As latitude and altitude increase and temperatures drop, the sowing period should be postponed. In production, attention should be paid to the weather forecast at the time, and sowing should be done in a sunny window at the “end of a cold spell and start of a warm one”. By taking advantage of a spell of sunny, warm weather after sowing, the seeds can root and enter the soil early, so that by the time the second cold air arrives, the seedlings have already taken root and become established, and will not suffer low-temperature chilling injury that causes seed and sprout rot.