Allotments 4 All

I do a three year rotation, but Im wondering now how it works with summer/winter crops in the same family. Eg. summer and winter brassicas, as that occupies more than one growing season (in my mind) or is this the way to do it properly.

Ideally I would love to do a 4 year rotation but not enough room for that.

I know it sounds a daft question, but its been bugging me today :-\

not a daft question at all star - I've been wondering the same thing as I drew my first lottie plan. looking forward to reading the responses from our resident experts!

Hey there's safety in numbers gal, I hope the answer isnt too obvious. Coz I'll feel like a right bint then lol ;D

hi star I don,t know how others do this but I get around it by drawing the begining of the season line in march-ish. at the moment the PSB is in last years bed and the spring greens in this years they will be joined by summer greens,when the spring greens are finished the winter ones go in . the onions just seem to float around
anywhere where they didn,t grow last year. I am really interested how others do it
good question
marg

Have you got a 3 or 4 year rotation Marg. It must be a lot easier with 4 years to fiddle with.

I understand what you have said and that makes sense, thank you.

I am not the best person to answer this as my plot is 80 by 10 yards and I have always maintained a clear four year rotation plan plus an extra bed for sundries and flowers etc. But here goes.

If you are short of space then brassicas pose a problem in that they take up the most room. They are the main crop that must be rotated to stop the development of clubroot. The safest way, to my mind, is to keep all the brassica plants from one spring/ summer seed sowing in one bed. That includes brussels, PSB, calabrese, swede, winter and spring cabbage etc. etc. That way you can always lime the one bed [if necessary] and also clearly remember where the brassicas have been.
The problem that a lot of people find is that they have sown the crops that follow on far too early and then they are looking to plant them out before the brussels and spring cabbage are clear.

Hi

I have made sure that i have 3 beds for each crop, one for overwintering one for spring summer and one for late summer early winter that was the only way around it i could think OTHER than using then longer crops as a companion plant for something else which ment as the other crop was pulled the longer crop was starting to need the extra space.

Cam

All my brassicas go in the same 2 - 3  beds, early & late. They get rotated through the crop rotation cycle. I always give enough room to get my spring & summer & winter stuff in. My brassica bed is just about finished now, just in time for the spuds to follow.

The autumn brassicas all go in one bed, the winter and early spring all go the other. Works well.

By inter-cropping with lettuce, radish, beetroot etc, it frees up room else where on the plot. So the following year it is all change, move round one  and start over. Not had any problems so far.

Thanks all, it has explained it beautifully. I hadn't thought of using more than one bed :-[ :-[

I have been pondering over  3or4 year rotoation, I have 250sq meter so any suggestions :)

I do a 5 year rotation on my standard plot because I have 3 groups of 4 raised beds, and two sets of two long row beds. It works because I don't grow very many roots, so I treat brassicas and roots as one group,so my rotation is;

Alliums, potatoes, legumes, brassicas & roots, others (tender crops sweetcorn, pumpkins tomatoes etc),

I find this rotation works for me as the groups do not overlap each other, so overwintered crops just stay where they are until the next group need the space, e.g;

Alliums (Nov-July, next March for leeks), Potatoes (March-July), Legumes (March-Oct), Brassicas & roots (March-following April), Others (June-Nov)...back to Alliums (Nov-March) and so on.

Where there are gaps, such as after the potato and overwintered onionand garlic  crops are harvested, I grow either late flowering annuals, or salad crops so there isn't spare ground lying around for very long! As soon a bed becomes empty I mulch it well and prepare it for the next thing... works for me!