Topic: Rotation

[jock_edin]

hi guys
just about got my 40mtr x 10mtr. allotment in order. Two thirds are 2x2 mtr. raised beds with paths around because of my difficulty on my feet, how important is the crop rotation I always read about as something's make sense to just bung same things in same place.  The larger area would do for the tatties, but to rotate into 2 mtr.square don't give much room for the spuds.  Anyone advice would be great as would where to get spreadsheets on allots.

                                   Yours
                                             Jock_edin

[Hugh_Jones]

Make a permanent site for your runner beans, rhubarb, and any fruit bushes you want to grow.  Everything else should be rotated on a 4 year basis. This is particularly important for potatoes (to avoid disease build up) and brassicas (because they like lime, and so should follow the potatoes which hate lime).  Everything else just follows suit.   If you try and grow everything in the same place for a few years you`ll find that you get chocolate spot in your broad beans, something similar (whose name escapes me) in the peas, neck rot in the onions, leek rust............well, need I go on?

[campanula]

2m x 2m are decent sizes for raised beds - mine are 3mx 1.5m, just slightly less surface area. You can pack in more than in standard rows. Also, having such clearly delineated areas makes rotation much easier. Just graph it out with your veg families worked out and move them around. I would have thought you could have a fair number of individual beds so it should be easy to have one for each specific type of produce. Right enough, 4 square metres is not a lot of room for tatties but if you just grew one sort in each bed and could raise the walls as they grow- gravel boards and 50mmx50mm stakes, perhaps - you should get seriously good crops from each bed. Anyhoo, good luck and enjoy :)

[Colin_Bellamy-Wood]

Hiya Jock, I put five raised beds on mine last year, looking ahead for when I'm really old - 66 this year so still a youngster, however.

I created three large plots 8m x 2m, 5 smaller plots 3m x 1.5m, 2 raised beds 2m by 1m, and 3 raised beds 1.5m x 1m.    Copying this layout onto a large sheet of paper, this was my spreadsheet onto which I pencilled in what to put where.

Spuds need to be rotated, but beans and peas are best not rotated.   In one of my raised beds I have mixed a lot of silver sand in with the soil to make it suitable for carrots, so carrots will go in there again next year.  

It's difficult to calculate how much room you have for your tatties, perhaps you can let us know.   As far as planting and tending  tatties, I found I was on my hands and knees for the whole time.   Digging them up might be a problem for you?   How high are you raised beds?

[Hugh_Jones]

As far as the potatoes are concerned, I should stick to earlies and 2nd earlies.  On a bed 2m x 2m you could get 7 earlies in a row or 5 2nd earlies, 2 rows to a bed. Quite a few of the 2nd earlies will keep every bit as well as maincrop, and you should get as big a crop as you would growing fewer maincrop at greater spacing.

[jock_edin]

Thanks for all the great info and ideas relating to rotating crops glad i can leave peas in same bed. Beds are 20cm high 8ins in old money.  I had to throw away 95% of this years onions so the neck rot prob. must have been because of non rotation.  There was a difference of opinion on rotating peas.  Two great minds with differing views its this that make Allotmenting a great hobby.

                            Jock
                   

[Colin_Bellamy-Wood]

Thanks for the info Jock, mine are about 30 ins high, yours are no-where near so high.   The reason I asked was because runner beans can grow 8ft or more.   So where you could grow runner beans in one of your raised beds, I couldn't in mine.    However when it comes to picking, would your difficulty cause problems, or could you manage a pair step ladders, or even a stool.

I made the mistake of thinking that peas and beans should be rotated, but John Miller on these boards corrected me, thank goodness.   John is an expert squared.

Your ideas for his tatties/spuds/potatoes, Hugh are a very good idea, and he could even get them spread, instead of in a glut that have to be stored.  

[Hugh_Jones]

I`m sorry, Colin, but I`m afraid that I have to correct you on your statement that peas and beans are best not rotated.  As I pointed out in my first reply, and as I have pointed out time after time on this and the Beeb Boards, runner beans should have a permanent site. Peas, on the other hand can be subject to disease from pathogens which build up in the soil after repeated sowings on the same site. True you may `get away with it` for a time, but if you do allow the pathogens to build up in the soil you will find that you cannot grow peas in that spot again for many years.  I know, because I tried it many years ago, and as a result I have one bed where, even after 5 years without peas, the pathogens were still active.

If John Miller said that you never need to rotate peas, then I think he is wrong, and as I`ve never known John to be wrong, then I can only assume that you have misquoted him.  I would therefore suggest that you find and re-read the posting to which you refer and check your facts.

[john_miller]

With responders like you on these boards Hugh I make sure I am never wrong on here. Wish I could the same everywhere else! If I did say don't rotate peas then I certainly was mistaken, probably rushing as I sometimes do, and apologise to Colin if I caused any confusion. I remember the discussion but haven't a clue where it was so I can't check back.

[john_miller]

Let me clarify that. I make sure that I am correct here so that no-one like Hugh, who obviously knows growing, has to waste their time correcting me.

[Hugh_Jones]

No need to apologise, John.  As Colin has gone all quiet I have tracked back and found the posting.  Your actual words were " It may be necessary to rotate peas to avoid build up of soil pathogens". Any apologies due are therefore due entirely from Colin.

Unfortunately, I had inadvertently pressed the wrong key and posted before I had completed my message. I WAS going to tell Colin that by repeatedly growing peas on the same site he would run the risk of encouraging the build up of Sclerotinia, Pea Wilt, Bacterial Blight, and the Root Rot causing Fungi - Aphanomyces Euteiches and Pythium Ultimum.  However, he will no doubt be satisfied with your own rebuttal.

[ina]

Annual rotation of potatoes seems so important that at our lottie complex it is mandatory.  It is written in the regulations and the committee members actually check on it. I think it has to do with the fact that potato blight is also airborne and with commercial growers in the area it could ruin their crop.

[rdak]

Hugh,
Have you ever tried treating Runner Beans as a perennial? A guy on my plot says that is how they grow in warmer climates and is going to try letting the frost kill of most of the plant, but they cut off a few inches from the ground and cover with some protection for the winer.

[Hugh_Jones]

I haven`t, because the climate in my area is such that I would have to lift them every autumn, pot them up, and keep them in the cold frame for the winter.  With the pressure on cold frame space during the winter  it just seems easier to grow fresh.  However, I am fairly certain that Tim has done it - maybe even still does - so perhaps we could persuade him to join in.


With regard to Ina`s posting., the reason for mandatory rotation of potatoes is more likely to be to prevent the build-up of erwinia caratovara, potato cyst eelworm, wart disease, or that wretched Potato Ring Rot disease which her country has just succeeded in exporting to us.

[Hugh_Jones]

Colin, Colin. Where are you Colin?  You can come out now - we promise not to shout at you!

[Colin_Bellamy-Wood]

Sorry to take so long to read this thread, I've been waxing lyrical about the Rugby.

Oh dear, I seem to be totally and utterly confused about what John Miller advised me.   Either I missed a posting, or I am suffering from senile dementia (and I'm only 66).

I apologies unreservedly to Jock for confusing him with bum info. and will research the original thread to find out where I went wrong.   What it does mean, of course, is that I must revise my plan for next year - oh eck!.  

[Colin_Bellamy-Wood]

Jock, I have searched and found the thread that Hugh was referring to, and I have put in a "reply" to bring it from page 3 to page 1 on the Edible Plants Board to make it easier for you to read.    Subject : Crop Rotation.  I strongly recommend it to you.

Once more my apologies.

[Hugh_Jones]

No Colin. It was YOU who referred to the thread - "John Miller said on these Boards" were your words.  The whole thread took place while I was catching fish in Cornwall, and I was not even aware of it until you mentioned it. That is why I suggested that you should find it and check what John had actually said.  It was purely as a result of your failure to respond and the awkward situation that you had placed John in that I hunted out the thread and saw it for the first time.

[campanula]

what are you like? boys!! He said....well he said.....then he said that....no he said it first......go and make a nice calming cup of tea or summat. ;D