I live in Pennsylvania, zone 6. Can I start grass seed now? Nothing fancy, just a regular "lawn mix" that's probably mostly perennial ryegrass. Or is it too late/too early?

IMO this is the best time of the year Annie.

From Penn State.

Late summer to early fall is usually the best time to establish a new lawn from seed.

http://plantscience.psu.edu/re...

When I lived in Oregon, I had a neighbor who had studied grasses extensively. He recommended putting out grass seed just before the first snow, so that the snow would cover it (and keep the birds from eating all your seed).

I like that, Woofie. I'm actually thinking about seeding grass over spring blooming bulbs in part of one of my beds this year. Of course it'll be a while yet before they send the bulbs, and it seems rather pointless to seed the grass now.

I was taught (turf management course) similar to Evan's Penn State link, late summer/early fall is the best time for seeding. The reasons given were that the soil is warm and there is less weed competition than in spring, and the seedlings should be up and running and hardened-off in time for winter. Also by the time the hot dry weather comes around again in the following year the plants have already rooted deeply, whereas spring sown ones are still shallow-rooted and the stand is thin so the soil temperature gets higher due to lack of shading from each other.

It was suggested that the third best time after late summer/fall, and then April-June (here in Ontario, probably earlier in PA) was what is called "dormant seeding" (mid-November here). At that time the seed doesn't germinate but waits until spring. This should only be on level ground with a straw mulch otherwise the seeds can get washed away when the snow melts. I guess this is similar to what Woofie suggested.

I have early-fall seeded and it worked very well.

Thanks everybody! If Penn State says seed now, by gum, I seed NOW!