Underplanting - help me understand it

[Sweet vetch]

Hello Rossa...

I'm new here. Please be patient with me as I'm not terribly computer literate.

Underplanting is usually a reference (in my neck of the world) to a crop planted to aide another by suppressing weeds, exchanging nutrients etc. An example would be planting dwarf clover or alyssum under cabbage.

Interplanting would be planting things that "get along" and help each other for crop harvesting. Such as corn and winter squash.

One of my favorites and the very first of the year is planting alternate rows of spinach and larkspur. I do this on March first (provided the soil has thawed!).
The spinach comes up first and when it begins to bolt it is cut back, by then the larkspur is growing fast on it's heels to provide months of cut flowers.

[Two_Sheds]

Please be patient with me as I'm not terribly computer literate.

I would disagree with that statement

[maytreefrannie]

I've never got the hang of underplanting - this discussion is interesting, though, and I look forward to more posts on the thread. Learning something everytime I log on to the Vine.

[Jono]

Not sure if this can be classed as underplanting, but I stuffed my brassica patch with African marigolds this year, and had virtually no whitefly at all. Normally I can't move for the pests.