The Three Part Crop Rotation
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This is the crop rotation favoured by many gardeners because of its simplicity.
After taking out the permanent beds, the growing space is divided into three
and handled as below.
The problem with this crop rotation system is that it assumes you will be
growing a lot of potatoes and brassicas. The third of the plot left over has
to cope with everything from onions and garlic to sweetcorn and squashes.
Neither does it allow much time before the potatoes are back in the same
bed and the lime left over from the brassicas is still keeping the pH level
high for them. Having said that, it is very easy to manage and any spaces
on the plot if you grow too few brassicas for example can be filled with crops
from the 'everything else' group.
We'll start our rotation year in the preceding winter - just to add to the
confusion. Don't worry, all will become clear.
- Plot 1 has manure added to it and this will feed the potatoes that follow
on. The nitrogen in the manure tends to make the soil more acid, which
is fine for potatoes that like a slightly acid soil.
- Plot 2 has lime added to take the pH level up towards neutral (7) for
the lime loving brassica family in the following year.
- Plot 3 is ignored, although a mulch with compost if available would be
useful.
Three Year Crop Rotation
| |
Year 1 |
Year 2 |
Year 3 |
| Plot 1 |
Potatoes followed by lime in the autumn |
Brassicas |
Everything Else followed by manure in the autumn |
| Plot 2 |
Brassicas |
Everything Else followed by manure in the autumn |
Potatoes followed by lime in the autumn |
| Plot 3 |
Everything Else followed by manure in the autumn |
Potatoes followed by lime in the autumn |
Brassicas |
On heavy clay soils you will probably be digging over each winter to allow
the frost's freezing and thawing action to break up the soil. With other soils
it would be a good idea to sow an over-wintering green manure crop to hold
nutrients that would be washed away in the rain.
The green manure can be dug into the soil in the spring to release those
nutrients and improve the soil's humus level with the organic matter. On
really light soils a green manure is vital to build good condition and
adding the manure or the lime in early spring after digging in the green manure
is suggested.
The early potatoes that come out of the ground in June and July can be followed
with French beans who are not too fussy about the acidity level of the soil
and will produce a crop on the same ground.
If you have enough land that you are not pushing for maximum crops and you
don't have clubroot to worry about, follow your potatoes with a green manure
of mustard. The use of mustard as a green manure after the early potatoes hardens
the cysts that contains the next generation of potato eelworm so preventing
them from hatching.
A lot will depend on your actual requirements when you set up and use a rotation
plan. The important part of your crop rotation is to keep things apart for
as long as possible. Keeping a plan of your plot and marking in what has been
planted where will prove of great value over the years because you are unlikely
to remember what was planted where after two years
More on Crop Rotation
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