Succession Planting

There is so much terminology thrown around in the garden world. Terms such as crop rotation, propagation, cover crops and succession planting can be confusing for a new gardener, but never fear, Plants Direct is here to help you wade through the lingo. Here we will be explaining succession planting, which when done successfully, can help extend your harvest time and reduce the glut of excess veggies that often occurs all at once in the season.

What exactly is succession planting and why should you bother?

Simply put, succession planting is a way of breaking up your planting schedule so that you have fresh vegetables all season long. If you put all your plants in at the same time, you will have a huge harvest all at once followed by nothing. By staggering your sowing, you can ensure a succession of plants to harvest one after another.

Although there are many ways of succession planting, such as planting immediately after harvesting, there are two other ways with much better success to prolong your crops. The first is to sow similar plants with different maturity dates such as early bearers, mid-season and a slow maturing. For example, Apollo (early bearer), Health Kick (mid-season) and Black Russian (slow maturing) are great tomatoes to keep you going throughout the whole season.

One of the best ways of succession planting is to make separate plantings of the same plant with time between. For example, planting lettuces every 2 weeks will ensure a continuous harvest for your salads. Think about how much you generally consume in your household in that period and plant the same amount each time.

Trial and error is the best way to figure out the how much to plant each time and how frequently. Fast croppers such as radishes can be planted more frequently whereas vegetables that take longer to be ready for harvest can be spaced out more.

Keep a record

As succession planting can be based on trial and error, we recommend keeping a diary of what and when you planted each season as well as notes about whether it was enough or too much to harvest throughout the season. You can refer back to these notes each year to fine tune and ensure success. This can also help you keep track of maturation dates, as these may differ to what was expected due to microclimates or changes to the weather beyond the norm.

We hope this guide helps you to plan you growing season and ensure you have an even, continuous supply of fresh veggies throughout the year.