Quick on the uptake? Me?

[HeyWayne]

D'you know, and it pains me to admit this, but it would seem that the following only truly dawned on me this weekend.

Just because you dedicate a particular bed to a particular type of plant, does not mean that you have to plant all the same plant in that space.

By that I mean, you can plant more than one type of bean in the "legume" bed, or several types of root in the "root" bed.

Last year I decided that my peas would go in the pea bed, runners in the runner bed, dwarves in the dwarf bed....

So much more space now!!

[Nicos]

Time for a rest now Wayne...too much thinking isn't good for you!!

[zazen999]

Aw; bless!!!

As long as you rotate the spuds and brassicas, you can pretty much mix everything else up as you wish...one of my most successful ideas was planting beans, peas, toms and courgettes in one plastic storage box. The beans and peas were up first, and the toms were growing and getting to full height as the beans/peas died off. Then the courgettes romped away, and gave me loads of harvest. the toms lasted out until the first frosts and just kept getting bigger and bigger, and I had a box of compost at the end to put straight on the winter brassica bed.

Having the lottie means that I can dedicate beds to each crop - but that doesn't mean to say that I won't interplant crops for quick wins here and there. This is where the time spent looking at companion planting helps. All spares will go out there on the off chance of extra crops.

Very little space is wasted here!

[HeyWayne]

Time for a rest now Wayne...too much thinking isn't good for you!!

Did I tell you I am originally from Dumbasscus?

[Flummery]

I'm growing my heritage beans and peas up wigwams (one type per wigwam - I'm not mixing them up THAT much!) and in the almost-triangular spaces at the edges of the bed I'm putting my sub-arctic plenty and tiger toms tomatoes. I just don't care, me!

[crichmond]

dwarves in the dwarf bed....

I bet Grumpy wasnt happy about that, but on the other hand sleepy wouldnt have realised...

[Eyren]

I bet Grumpy wasnt happy about that, but on the other hand sleepy wouldnt have realised...

I was wondering what the dwarves were doing in there too, for a moment...

I had a real headache trying to work out how to fit potatoes, brassicas, onions, roots, legumes and three sisters into my rotation, until I realised:

1. Since I only grow new potatoes not maincrops (limited space), they actually fit in quite nicely with winter brassicas, which don't need to be planted out until the new potatoes have been harvested

2. Onions and carrots (and their cousins) make good companions, like similar soil conditions and don't take up a lot of space, so they make another group.

Now I only have four groups: spuds + brassicas, onions + carrots, legumes, and three sisters - easy peasy!