After a shocking year I have decided to pretty much start again, dig over my allotment set up 4 new beds for spuds, brassicas, roots & legumes and I am prepared to spend a bit on compost and manure. I know plenty of manure for spuds bed - any advice for preparing the other three at this time of year? Just read a few websites and got myself confused. Cheers.
Just make sure you don't manure the roots bed. :toothy10:
Basic rotation
Spuds- manure
Legumes- trench and fill with compostable stuff
Brassicas- no dig and apply lime
Roots- dig if want and if onion white rot a problem try applying garlic "tea" to activate the spores which die when nothing to live on.
now there will be lots of posts saying something completely different!
Apart from autumn broad beans, garlic and onion sets and some specialities like chard and winter spinach, I would put each bed down to winter green manure to dig in in Spring.
I find the 4 crop system rather over simplistic. It leaves a lot of questions, such as what about courgettes, chard and onions, what goes in after the potatoes get the blight, and how do you sow parsnips when the Purple Sprouting Brocolli, winter cabbage and spring greens are still there.
Thanks for the comments, I have wondered about green manure but seems a lot of work, I may experiment with one of the 4 beds. The roots bed will be mainly onions, leeks, garlic and some parsnips - have read conflicting views about manure and onions. I have a few other small areas where I can put courgettes and other bits and bobs.
I'd go with eight, sweetcorn, brassicas, roots that aren't onions combined with randoms, onions, beans, a double set for spuds and cucurbits, I guess if you want to simplify then you'd combine roots and onions, beans and cucurbits, and brassicas and sweetcorn..., but really I just put stuff in where it fits, preferably where it wasn't last year, but given how stands of beans spring up around my plots that can be a bit hard...Given how heavily I'm manuring my plots ATM, it's not much of an issue, everywhere gets manured, it's just when....
I put dwarf French beans in after my blighted potatoes, some to eat as green pods, other for dried beans. I've lifted two stands of French beans and sown some winter spinach in one spot and planted garlic in the second- three plantings in the same spots since mid April!
My rotation is also a little haphazard. The onions and potatoes and tomatoes and beans/peas get moved every year as I grow more of those than other things. The rest goes in in whatever speaces become available! Onions I have always manured and my crop is always good....