Bean Screen

I planted beans around two of my beds to shelter them from the hot afternoon sun. It's working well and giving me plenty of beans. Here's few I picked tonight to go with those tomatoes for dinner. There's a mix of Blue Lake and Purple King.



Corn and Beans

The corn is coming along and the beans are starting to curl their way around the stalks. Last year I planted the beans a bit too late and they got shaded out. This year I planted at the same time as the corn. I'm a bit concerned that the beans may choke the corn, but with my trusty secateurs I'll be able to control things. You can see the third sister, the pumpkins, up in the top right hand corner of the photo. These are just about ready to start their rise to perpendicularity.



The Three Sisters Revisited

Last year I made an attempt at a companion planting combination called the three sisters. This involves planting corn, beans and pumphins together. The corn supports the climbing beans, the pumpkins shade the soil and prevent weeds and the beans help fix nitrogen for next years crops. It didn't work, mainly, I think, because I planted the beans too late and they were shaded out of existence by the corn. This year I've planted everything at the same time. The pumkins are going to be grown vertically as usual but I've put in a bean seed next to the corn seeds. They're up and going so we'll see what happens.



The Three Sisters

Today I planted some Bule Lake climbing bean seeds amongst the corn. This is part of a native american indian companion planting combination known as the three sisters. The sisters are corn, beans and squash. The idea is that the corn provides support for the beans, the squash, in my case butternut pumpkins, shade the soil keeping in moisture and smothering weeds. Even though my butternuts are going to be growing vertically I'll let some tendrils creep amongst the corn. The beans fix nitrogen in the soil for the next crop. They are also a good nutritional combination. I've never tried this before and as a big fan of companion planting it will be interesting to see how it works out. Not much to see at this stage apart from the corn but i'll keep up to date as things progress.