This whole 'crop rotation' lark

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This whole 'crop rotation' lark
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cab

Joined: 01 Nov 2004
Posts: 32429

Posted: Fri Jan 05, 07 10:16 pm Post subject: This whole 'crop rotation' lark

I just can't ever seem to do it right. Its all very well having proper crop rotation if you have all the ground free at the same time, but with sprouting broccoli likely to be going into summer, with carrots being in the ground for ages yet, beetroot and salsify standing into Spring, and of course Spring cabbages, Jerusalem artichokes, swedes, leeks... How does anyone ever have a bed fully empty? How does anyone ever get enough space free to get things dug over properly for a proper rotation?

I look at the old timers plots with empty spaces and all of a crop lifted at a time and I can't help but wonder what they actually eat for most of the year.

Is this just a me thing?

jema
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 28362
Location: escaped from Swindon

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 12:54 am Post subject:
Given my lack of space this has long been a bug bear with me

aussie

Joined: 05 Jan 2007
Posts: 18
Location: Australia

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 7:42 am Post subject:
I find you need a plot at least the size of a tennis court to do this successfully, but it sure works if you can get it going, with big increases in production.

sean
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 28 Oct 2004
Posts: 42228
Location: North Devon

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 10:51 am Post subject:
Couldn't you subdivide into smaller sub-beds and rotate within them. That woman on the telly last night was making 3' square beds I think.

wellington womble

Joined: 08 Nov 2004
Posts: 15051
Location: East Midlands

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 11:07 am Post subject:

I think its just hard to it all in one go. Mentally number or name your beds, and just decide what's going in there next time round, and start filling it up with them. For example, my onions follow my brassica's, so I plant my garlic and autumn onions in the same bed as the PSB is still in. At the same time, I'll be planting broad beans in the bed which still has winter carrots and other root veg. I mostly organise my rotation around where there is room at the right planting times, to take advantage of this, rather than the traditional rotations.

It's not perfect, but it does ensure some rotation with maximum cropping throughout the year. I just think of it as a fluid process, not as a defining moment of this year and next year. I hasten to add that this worked well with a 3m square plot, and I have no idea how its going to work with a bigger one. Ask me next January!

Mrs Fiddlesticks

Joined: 02 Nov 2004
Posts: 10460

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 11:38 am Post subject: Re: This whole 'crop rotation' lark

cab wrote:

I look at the old timers plots with empty spaces and all of a crop lifted at a time and I can't help but wonder what they actually eat for most of the year.

Is this just a me thing?

looking at the old timers plots round here I'd say it was a fairly traditional mix of things. Spuds, large area for brassicas, runner beans,onions, carrots, a bit of sweetcorn and the odd tomato plant, dahlias and statice. Thats about it. I wonder if the traditional crops just fit better in to the traditional rotation thing and whether different ideas are needed to cope with the variety of things we now grow.

The new plot holders are I think more adventurous, its on their plots you'll see asparagus, globe artichokes and new varieties of lettuce.

We just go by not growing the same thing on the same bit of land as last year, its worked so far but I expect we ought to be more strict about it.

Bernie66

Joined: 14 Jan 2005
Posts: 13967
Location: Eastoft

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 11:40 am Post subject:
It can't be done porperly if you are seriously trying to feed yourself off your plot, unless its massive. I have learnt the hard wasy, and now happily accept that to be productive properly a plot can't be pretty. And I am happy with productive.

gil
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 08 Jun 2005
Posts: 18421

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 3:59 pm Post subject:
Works alright up here, where very little overwinters, apart from leaf beet and some brassicas (kales and PSB), also leeks if grown, and onions/garlic. I also have to lift and store root veg, as frost, disease (e.g. parsnip canker) or pests will get them otherwise. The growing season is short, so the PSB is over by the time I sow the roots. And I have a fair-sized growing area, which helps.

cab

Joined: 01 Nov 2004
Posts: 32429

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 4:05 pm Post subject:

Our growing conditions down here couldn't be much more different and still in the British Isles, Gil. Yesterday we feasted on summer calabrese, which is still giving us side shoots, and fresh dug salsify and leeks. Still harvesting carrots, leaf beet, celery, beetroot, brassicas, etc. Its only the reall tender stuff (beans, courgettes and squashes, fennel, etc.) that has died off, most of the rest of whats left is still leafy and happy looking.

Mrs Fiddlesticks

Joined: 02 Nov 2004
Posts: 10460

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 4:17 pm Post subject:
so the old rules not only have to be adapted to a more varied crop but also climate change. Are they due a re-write to some extent?

gil
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 08 Jun 2005
Posts: 18421

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 4:30 pm Post subject:

One factor to take into account is the difference between the south and east of the country as a whole, and the colder, wetter north and wes t (give or take a bit of Gulf Stream on the coast). Daylight hours through the year also make a difference - we get a lot more day in the summer, and a lot less in the winter. These influence what can be grown, and when to sow / harvest. Climate conditions also bear on what pests / diseases are prevalent.

Climate change will need to be taken into account, but I suspect it will not have the same effects all over the country. I live in hope of an extended growing season, but there is no sign of it yet.

Good things about being north : by the time it is warm enough to sow carrots, the first generation of carrot fly has been, not found anything to munch, and gone. Also, even when sowing oddly late by southern standards, plants catch up and grow like crazy.

Short growing season here makes it difficult to work a green manure into the rotation - the organic advice seems to be to make do with a 'weed mulch' over the winter, i.e. don't dig over and compost/manure plots till just before sowing / planting out in spring. This is very different to growing practice further south.

Winter rain in the west means that if you manure plots much before then, a horrifying amount of the nutrients will be washed away before your seeds ever hit the soil (about 75% of their nutrient value - this diminishes the nearer you get to sowing. Manuring in late winter preserves about 70-80%, and in early spring about 90%. But autumn or early winter digging and manuring loses massive amounts of goodness).

Behemoth

Joined: 01 Dec 2004
Posts: 19023
Location: Leeds

Posted: Sat Jan 06, 07 5:36 pm Post subject:

I do my best, having beds helps bring some order but half my plot still has something on it though it'll mostly be gone come spring giving me a hungry gap. I have club root and shallow patches of soil to further add to the limitations.

I don't know if anybody has this but when I started I thought about my spring sowing of summer cabbages as being 'first' followed by my winter brassicas as the second. However if you turn it around and grow winter brassicas on a patch and follow these with planting out your summer brassicas you get one season on a patch with brassicas and best use of the space. Does that make sense?

Gavin Bl

Joined: 14 Jul 2006
Posts: 281
Location: Cardiff

Posted: Thu Jan 11, 07 12:30 pm Post subject:
what do you do, when you are basically stuck with a tiny back garden plot like me? I thought I would just grow very productive, easy payback stuff like salad leaves and runner beans, possibly calabrese? How could I work that? Should I divide it up with planks or something?

cab

Joined: 01 Nov 2004
Posts: 32429

Posted: Thu Jan 11, 07 12:58 pm Post subject:

Gavin Bl wrote:

what do you do, when you are basically stuck with a tiny back garden plot like me? I thought I would just grow very productive, easy payback stuff like salad leaves and runner beans, possibly calabrese?

How could I work that? Should I divide it up with planks or something?

I did that for donkeys years before getting the plot, and it isn't easy. Your best bet is to rotate as best you can (not following like with like at the very least), and to concentrate on growing those crops that really build up pests for themselves and that have fussy requirements in pots.

I still don't divide our little garden up with planks or owt like that (there'd be practically no space left

), but I do take note of what grew where last year to allow me to rotate. So, for example, the patches of ground where tomatoess grew last year will get peas and lettuce this year, and I'll grow toms where I had celtuce, sorrel, and annual herbs, and the sorrel got dug up and moved to flank the little bit of grass by the herb bed... and I'll grow catch crops under the tomatoes till they get shaded out.

Advice for which crops to grow in a tiny space can be found here:
https://www.downsizer.net/Projects/Growing_Food/Growing_Vegetables_in_a_Small_Space/

gil
Downsizer Moderator

Joined: 08 Jun 2005
Posts: 18421

Posted: Thu Jan 11, 07 12:59 pm Post subject:

No need for owt so formal as planks - sticks at the edge will do to mark what was grown where. Sounds as though you have three main types of veg : salads; legumes; brassicas. So just move those around in succession from year to year.

Because of the difference in height (low-growing salads / tall runner beans), make sure that the way you divvy up the plot or sow the rows ensures that all crops get sunshine.

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