Grow Your Own Magazine

I may be getting a little confused here.

Can someone explain how to rotate crops when companion planting ?

If I plant alliums with brassicas then do I have to rule out both groups for next year ?

All very complicated

Companion planting helps to support each other by releasing nutrients into the ground, ward off insects or provide shelter to mention a few. I think, but am not sure that if you rotate them together, it would do no harm.

As for alliums with brassicas, it may have only been an example, but i wouldnt mix them, although i would go for leeks. But i am sure if i am wrong, the forum will let me know.

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good Diggin, Chuffa.

Vescere bracis meis.

I think it's carrots & alliums that would usually go together, to deter carrot rootfly. These 2 crops are fine to be grown together and can be moved around the rotation together. I have grown leeks & cabbages in the same bed, as they were both my winter crop, but I'll be following them with peas & beans, then sweetcorn & squashes the year after, then potatoes the year after that, so shouldn't be a problem in the rotation (I hope!).

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Sarah

http://www.hypermobility.org


“Tell me one last thing,” said Harry. “Is this real? Or has this been happening inside my head?”
“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?”

The reason for rotating is to avoid building up pests and diseases in the soil and to a lesser extent to give the soil a chance to recover and build its fertility back up.

The idea is that you leave as long as possible between growing the same thing in the same place.

Therefore, if you wish to continue your companion planting and practice rotation, you need to move on all the things that have been growing in a particular spot.

Theoretically.........yes! But you have still got loads to choose from the following year including spuds,Legumes and roots and everything else!

Just as an aside, why do you want to plant alliums with brassicas? I know they are supposed to be compatable but could you not seperate the two beds so that they were next to each other and gain whatever you'd hoped to gain that way? Also interested in which alliums you intend growing with which brassicas?
As you say, all very complicated!

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My Majesty made for him a garden anew in order
to present to him vegetables and all beautiful flowers.- Offerings of Thutmose III to Amon-Ra (1500 BCE)

Hi Maf,

I am starting to be fully companion planting this year along with the crop rotations.
One of my book does suggest using onion family (spring onions/ onions) to companion plant with the brassica. If I am not mistaken, it is to deter the leaf miner & cabbage white (but not very effective). You only need a couple of the onions to companion your brassica. You see it as brassica group for the crop rotations. I am not sure of using leek as it need long growing seasons, but it might work if you companion it with brussels sprout or early purple sprouting broccoli.

Apart from onion family, you can companion brassica with chinese celery, cammomile and several other (will have to look at the book again).

Hope this help.

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I grow, I pick, I eat ...

I fully understand the theory behind companion planting but cannot help thinking am I attracting for example blackfly onto my lottie veg? Maybe had I not done so then my veg would be safe from them.Seems a fine line. Does anyone else feel this way?

Always have nasturshams in the veggie plot, they are self sown and never seem to have problems with blackfly. I let pot marigolds self seed there as well.

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Gardening requires a lot of water - most of it in the form of perspiration. Lou Erickson, critic and poet

there is a school of thought that rotation is over-rated...

If you're growing in a relatively small space, the argument goes, rotating doesn't make much difference as most pests and diseases can travel several metres in each direction anyway.

And some veg growers now are simply growing the same thing in the same place until it develops problems, then moving it on.

I'm not sure I'd quite advocate this - don't want to wait till I've got onion rot or clubroot and then have to never grow onions/brassicas in that spot again and would rather prevent it by rotating. But certainly I don't think you should lose sleep over it. A bit of muddling up, and even growing the same sort of thing in the same place a couple of years running, won't do any harm.

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God made rainy days so gardeners could get the housework done.

re carrot fly,when the tops show then earth up the carrots .the fly cant lay through soil

is earthing up something you do with success,did you get carrot fly previously,and how high would you suggest to do it do you leave the earthed up soil loose or give it a we pat

I have sown marigolds for companion planting and would like to do nastursiums too - what are the benefits of each please?