Double Up for a Bigger Harvest

Double your harvest without increasing your garden space. Try planting short season vegetables like lettuce, radishes and beets between long season vegetables like tomatoes, peppers, okra, cabbage, and broccoli.  When the short season veggies are ready to harvest, the longer season larger vegetables will need the space.

This also reduces weeding. The short season veggies fill the voids, helping fend off weeds until the larger plants take over.

Plus, the shade of larger vegetable plants can provide a cooling effect for spinach, lettuce, and other cool weather plants as they mature and the weather warms.  You’ll have a better tasting harvest thanks to the added shade.

The strategy can also reduce thinning.  Mix radish and carrot seeds before seeding them in the garden.  The radishes will be ready to harvest in about 30 days.  Once removed, the radishes free up space for the carrots to continue to grow and mature over the next 30 days.  Two crops from one row and less thinning needed.

A bit more information:  Continual planting throughout the season can also increase your harvest.  Follow fast growing cool season plantings like lettuce and radishes with warm season cucumbers and beans.  Once these are harvested, finish off the season with another planting of beets, radishes, spinach or lettuce.

Tags

lettuce harvest tomatoes peppers cabbage radishes broccoli beets interplanting bush-beans okra

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