Succession Planting Your Vegetable Garden – An Intensive Gardening Method

As mentioned last week, Succession Planting allows you to plant multiple crops in the same space during the year.  Most gardeners with limited garden space could benefit from using this Intensive Gardening Method.

Succession gardening could be implemented by 1) growing varying climate vegetables, by 2) growing early, then late maturing vegetable varieties and by 3) successively sowing vegetables for continuous harvests.

Varying Climate Vegetables

Imagine having lettuce and peas before you even start to plant your normal spring garden. Many of these cool weather vegetables can be planted well before the last frost of spring and can be harvested in time to get warm weather, vegetables planted. Then again towards the end of the warm weather growing season, plant cool weather veggies once more.

Early & Late Maturing Vegetables

By planting both early and late maturing varieties, not only will you be able to harvest the fruits of your labor over a longer period of time, but those early maturing varieties, when they are finished producing, can be removed to make room in your garden to plant the next round of vegetables.

Continuous Plantings

For fast-growing and/or short-lasting vegetables, like lettuce could be continuously planted every 2-4 weeks. This allows for a longer, drawn-out harvest, instead of having more than you really can use at one time and having your veggies possibly bolt before you can harvest them.

Years ago, along with most other casual gardeners, I would plant all of my vegetables at once – in the ground – after the final threat of last frost had passed. I would buy transplants from the local garden center of whatever they had in stock. This would usually consist of things like tomatoes, cukes, strawberries and onion sets as well as broccoli, lettuce and various other greens. Most of the time, my tomatoes would be ready for harvest just before the fall set in – if the summer cooperated that is (Pacific Northwest summers aren’t always dependable). My lettuce and broccoli would grow vigorously. However, the broccoli heads would always be really small and the lettuce greens bitter. They would bolt quickly before I had a chance to really enjoy them. In addition, I never could grow all the varieties I really wanted to since I have a small yard.

Once I made it my mission to learn how to grow as much food as I could in the space that I have, I became aware of various Intensive Gardening techniques, such as Succession Planting. I realized that my broccoli and greens would be much more productive and flavorful if grown during cooler weather. They would last longer since they wouldn’t bolt as quickly. In addition, if I planted these veggies in a different “season” than what I was accustomed to planting in, then I would have room to grow cauliflower, kale and other varieties that I’d always wanted to.  Now, I plant cool weather vegetables and more varieties of them early in the year. I create a plan for which warm weather vegetable will take their place once harvested and then plant cool weather vegetables again once the warm weather veggies have run their course.

For instance:

• I would plant “early”, cool weather peas in the back of my raised garden bed where I also had a trellis attached. You need to know when planning your succession garden the days-to-harvest of each vegetable. Peas are a quick harvester (60 days or so) so by the time I had harvested my peas, the weather was warming enough to plant my summer beans in the place of the peas which also needs to use the trellis.
• I would also plant spinach around the same time that I planted my peas. Once harvested, I would then plant both early, determinate tomatoes along with mid or late season, indeterminate varieties. (Determinate means to grow, flower, fruit and then it’s done, whereas indeterminate means the plant keeps growing and producing fruit as long as conditions permit.) This would provide fresh tomatoes for a longer period of time and when my determinate plants were finished producing – now I would have room for another veggie type.

Now, remember I said vegetables like lettuce and salad greens do better in cooler weather? That doesn’t mean you can’t grow them during warmer weather though.  If you use the shade of larger plants as sun protection and add mulch to keep the root base of the plants cooler then you can grow those at warmer times of the year. So those determinate tomatoes that I just talked about replacing could provide room for cooler weather varieties. The taller, indeterminate tomato plants could provide the shading needed. Additionally, many of these types of vegetables can be harvested as “baby”. They haven’t grown fully, but will be generally be sweeter and not have a chance to become bitter in the warmth. To do this, plant just a few at a time and then sow more every couple of weeks to have a constant supply available. Remember, instead of planting seeds directly into the ground, you do have the option of starting seeds indoors and transplanting the seedlings into the garden when you’re ready to.

Of course, this is an example of how I use succession planting to grow for a longer period of time and does not take into account the importance of crop rotation. Crop rotation is for another blog post, but in summary you should not plant the same crop in the same garden bed or area year after year. I have more than one raised garden bed and rotate my crops from year to year in each one.

Here in the Pacific Northwest, we have a fairly mild climate with a variety of micro-climates and usually don’t get a hard frost until November-ish. So as soon as I start

Multi-Season Raised Garden Bed Kit with Cloche

harvesting the summer vegetables I am already replacing them with cool weather vegetables again for one last harvest. Of course, as backup I have protective cloches to cover up my beds if I have to. Those growing in harsher climates may need to depend more on frost-protection, such as cloches, row covers, cold frames or some other type of season extender.

If you’re a beginner gardener or simply have never tried your hand at succession planting, start slowly. Maybe just try one or two approaches the first year and then incorporate your new-found experience into each consecutive year until you feel you’ve maximized your potential harvest that succession gardening can offer.  With careful planning and developing a planting schedule for yourself, you can enjoy the rewards of your garden much longer than you probably knew.

Succession planting is the first of our Intensive Gardening Methods Learning Series. Next Friday, we’ll talk about another method – Using Raised Garden Beds to Maximize Yields.  If you haven’t done so already, you might want to subscribe to our blog now so you don’t miss out!

For more information on Succession Planning Tips.

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