My Variation on the Three Sisters

For the past several years I have tried growing the three staple crops of corn, squash and beans in a few different variations on the theme.  The first year I found some instructions online for planning out the crops together.  The layout was such that the hills of corn and bean alternated with the hills of squash in a checker pattern.  The corn on the outside of the plantings did great and the beans grew well, but were difficult to harvest, while the squash withered away from lack of sun shortly after the corn and beans grew tall enough to shade them out.  That year I wasn't sure if it was my irrigation set up that doomed the plantings, or my timing of the plantings.

The next time I tried it, I did a block of corn edged on one side with pole beans, with the squash growing in it's own row in front of the beans.  That year the beans were a little easier to harvest, but I planted them at the same time as the corn and they quickly overtook the corn before it was tall enough or strong enough to support the weight.  By the end of the season the beans and corn were laying on the ground in a tangled mat.  The squash did ok, but again may have gotten too much shade and didn't take long to succumb to powdery mildew in the damp environment.

This year is yet another variation on the three sisters theme.  This time I planted the corn as early as I could for the row that was to be shared with the pole beans.  Every few feet down the row I planted a small block of corn.  They came up slowly in late April and survived a few light frosts.  Once most of the corn seedlings were about six inches tall I planted the pole beans every few inches around the outside of the corn.  My hope is that this year the corn has a chance to get nice and sturdy and tall before the beans really start to climb them and get heavy.  I'm hoping that planting the corn in this small block will help them to support each other as the bean plants wind between them.

The other row of corn was planted in longer blocks with a three foot spacing between them.  This row was planted around Mother's Day and didn't take nearly as long to come up as the first planting of corn.  Once this row of corn spouted I planted the squash in the gaps between the blocks of corn.  I hope that by planting them while the corn is still small gives them enough time to get established so they can start spreading out from the front of the row.  Happy squash plants can get enormous and one of the varieties I am trying this year claims to need at least five feet between plants.  Once they get going they should make an excellent ground cover with their big, fan like leaves.

I have been having a hard time keeping up with the weeding in these long rows.  I have mostly been focusing on the main areas where the crops are growing, but now the walking paths are becoming a problem.  The weeds there seem to be quite happy from the plentiful watering they share with my irrigated rows.  I hope I can keep them at bay long enough for my crops to outgrow them.  Once the corn is taller than the weeds, things should get easier.