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Planting Squashes, Pumpkins and Courgettes in raised beds -spacing?

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George the Pigman:
Any advice on planting pumpkins, squashes and courgettes in raised beds? I'm new to the raised bed system after growing plants in an open system for 30 years and have plants grown and ready to go in.
I have lots of 4ft by 8ft beds available but using the traditional planting distances quoted for open areas (about 2.5ft-4ft depending on type) would be lucky to get more than four plants in a bed and would start to run out of beds for my other plants.
Suggestions welcome!

Tee Gee:
Are you growing your squashes vertically?

If you are, spacing is not as critical as it is with the others, because when they are fully grown there is a good chance all your plants will be intertwined unless you train them to grow as cordons.

Say 3-4 ft apart

Courgettes, I would say 2-3 ft apart.

Pumpkins like squash will send out runners, and they generally crawl across the top of the bed, so 2-3 ft apart should be fine, more so if you train the runners to go where you want them to go.

So in a 8x4 bed I would say

Squash X-X-X
           X-X-X

Courgettes;  X-X-X-X
                   X-X-X-X

Pumpkins;X-X-X-X
               X-X-X-X

Hope this helps!




 

Deb P:
I grow all my squash vertically apart from letting a couple of plants roam freely around my sweetcorn.
Courgettes go into 1m square cubes ( see my gallery for pics) and as they fruit I remove the lower leaves and train the plants up a stake which makes picking easier.
Other squash are trained up a small polytunnel frame and hang down like Christmas decorations! I’ve grown Sharks fin squash up trees before and they were the size odd basketballs! I wish I had taken a photo!

Obelixx:
I too tend to allow 1 square metre per plant and try and get the ones that spread themselves to do it vertically.   Builders' rusty mesh for reinforcing concrete is good as it can take the weight.

George the Pigman:
Thanks to you all.
I have never grown them vertically before just let them sprawl as I have been growing them on open ground.

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