katylaide
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Is planting in rows the best way to do it?

This is a pretty hypothetical question, but I hope to have a nice permaculture setup when I have my own house one day so I thought I'd ask. I'm a fan of companion planting and copying nature where appropriate, so is planting vegetables in rows of the same variety the best way to do it, or is it better to plant certain plants in a planned area, but not necessarily in fixed rows? Does anyone know of any scientific studies on this subject (I have access to a few good databases through my university)?

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rainbowgardener
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It's actually a pretty broad general question and difficult to answer in this form. You put this in the permaculture forum, so I would think the general is answer is that permaculturists probably don't plant in rows very much, being more into creating plant guilds and more natural ways of growing.

But what do you mean by best? People traditionally planted in rows mainly for convenience... being able to identify the seedlings from the weeds when they come up, being able to hoe down between the rows, and what works with mechanical planters, hoers, etc.

If you mean the biggest yields of vegetables probably not. Check out the website https://www.squarefootgardening.com/ or look for the book Square Foot Gardening. It's about how to grow edibles in closely spaced blocks instead of rows.

Then the companion planting folks do mixed up plantings. Does this increase the yield, probably not especially when you count in the space devoted to the other things, but it is "best" in other ways - plants that repel insects or act as trap crops for insects, or fix nitrogen or provide needed shade or lots of other ways that plants can benefit each other, and support the ecosystem, attract pollinators, provide habitat, etc.

It's odd for someone who says they are into permaculture and companion planting to even be asking if it is best to grow straight rows of monoculture crops.

Definitely if you want scientific studies, then you have to define your terms more, what crops do you want, what do you mean by best, etc.

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I don't speak as a permaculturist; I do not have the credentials or the training. But much of this is common sense and using terrain instead of linear form to define gardens or rows just makes sense. Matching crops, interplanting, using vertical space, no till; all these things laid claim to by permaculture are taken from older gardening traditions. Fukuoka-san's seed balls are an old Japanese planting method he revived. No till gardening has been practiced in New Guinea for 4500 years. Rows? The southern lowland tribes in New Guinea practice protofarming with sago right in place in the swamp. No rows at all, no farm, just food. That's best for them... I think we find best ways to do things each for ourselves...

Here's the problem; you are looking for scientific data from a group that doesn't like science much. Permaculture and science have pretty much parted ways since Fukuoka-san ditched his degree, it seems. I have recently been dissapointed in the lack of scientific backstopping, and even anti-scientific feeling in permaculture circles, right to the upper levels of the movement, all seemingly still awash in the bitterness of Fukuoka-sensei's rejection of chemical culture. It is a shame as the data you seek would be truly welcome by so many, and would likely help inspire more to follow the intent of Fukuoka-san, if not the letter...

So science, no. But common sense informs that if terrain and space isn't an issue, rows will work fine. In smaller, irregular spaces keyholes or mandalas might make more sense, but if the space is a rectangle, they might not. Permies seem to dislike rows but mostly because the rest of nature doesn't use them often, not because of any scientific evidence I've seen. They do like curved rows to slow and capture water on a slope; there's a great idea worthy of adoption by anyone. But they won't till even when soil is so fungal it becomes less suitable for food crops, because Fukuoka-sensei said, so science be danged. To me that's a cult of personality, the sort of fundamentalist thinking I have trouble with. You can add compost when you make the bed, but no additions after that? Ever? Why? Why not?

Permaculture is full of great ideas and great thinkers, and much of it holds value to any gardener who values his soil. Early founder Dave Holmgren has taken his thinking to the next level in explaining the failings of our current systems, and the need for new thought; I find the clarity of his thought amazing. I see the truth behind the movement, and look for a joining of natural gardening and science because I have seen the value in both. But I have been dissappointed to find so many answers given from faith and not fact, so just don't be surprised if you get some funny looks talking about data around the perm crowd...

HG

katylaide
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Thanks HG, I like your insight. I like how you say that we find the best ways to do things each for ourselves. You might be interested in a little article my dad wrote at https://www.bettatrading.com.au/How-Not-to-Grow-Roses.php . He was a technical officer for agricultural scientists for 18 years, a gardener for at least 50, and is a wealth of scientific knowledge when it comes to gardening food and ornamental plants, but isn't afraid to break the rules if it works. Apologies for his random capitalisation.

Hypothetically speaking, when I said 'best' I meant the most effective way to create a balanced ecosystem (?) where the plants are healthy/not too stressed and produce good quality and acceptable-sized yields. But it's possible to companion plant in rows, isn't it? Like having a row of say marigolds and a row of tomatoes next to each other, or something like that. I guess I wasn't quite right when I said I'd like a permaculture setup, because I get that it's a specific kind of agriculture. What I should have said was I'd like to have a sustainable food garden which borrows from permaculture wherever I feel it appropriate and effective. For now I have two vegetable beds contained by bits of old furniture I found around our land last September, and that's about the extent of my gardening experience, so you can see that I'm really new to gardening.

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HG I enjoyed that post a lot. But what if we flip it? Could we say that followers of science are susceptible to voluntary blindness? Seems to me a human trait that governs how we behave as groups, regardless of philosophy and ideology. Is it perhaps an evolutionary trait shared by our species? Sometimes science brings us forward, sometimes it drags us towards a precipice with a false sense of certainty.

I truly believe that nothing spoken is wasted, even by those who claim not to hear you.

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Toil, you make Fukuoka-san's case, one that I am not blind to by any stretch. I have made myself a bit of a professional pariah in pursuit of technique and policy that don't fit the "scientific" models (better living through chemistry, etc.). We often fail to see the obvious for looking at technical detail (I had this thought last night reading an old Rodale book on coompost and looking at a USDA photo of a "zinc deficient" corn stalk, and looking at the dry, crusty soil it was in and thinking "I know what it's deficient in just looking at the photo, and zinc is just the symptom.")

But swinging to the opposite extreme hardly seems an answer to bad science. If we ignore science we can see is leaning towards poor long term result, that's good. If we lean away from science because it is not telling what we want to hear? Not so good. But your point is taken...

Katy, your da and I would get on just fine. This is the kind of science I like the best; common sense backed by personal observation. Fukuoka-san talked often about observation, how watching your particular land can tell you more than we might ever find from data collected from a hundred other sites. That is a sound thought I can support wholly. But I think of science as the best possible observation one can make, so why would one not avail oneself?

You have taken my point perfectly; absolutely, rows can work, but so can clusters and freeform and keyholes or mandalas. We cannot get too tied into the science, this is true, but we should not get too tied into the rhetoric either. I like the sound of sustainable borrowing from permaculture; sounds like my garden. Keep an open mind; it is the best gardening tool there is...

HG

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I like NOT planting in rows, usually. But Raibowgardener's point about seedling recognition is not to be overlooked, especially for beginning gardeners, and particularly if you don't know how to recognize weed seedlings.

In my small garden, I often plant in rows to visually separate one planting space from another. Last spring, I planted a row of mixed mesculun seeds to separate the bush bean patch (with two watermelon plants in it) from the broccoli patch (with cukes along the fence in the back of it) and realized I didn't know what the seedlings of all the different salad seeds in the packet looked like. :roll: Some seedlings that I allowed to grow out turned out to be weeds. Some turned out to be edible weeds so that worked out. :wink:

It's easier to start inter-planting and guild-planting with transplants. When interplanting in a deep, well-prepped bed, use the in-row distance added together then divided by 1/2: e.g. Distance between Plant A and Plant B where in-row distance for A=12" and B=6" -- (A+B)/2=9"

Some research do show that Companion/Interplanting help confuse the pest bugs, if you choose your plants carefully. Planting in what I call "patches" -- also known as "Wide Rows" though mine are never long enough to be called rows -- I guess some people call them "blocks" -- helps to crowd out weeds.

Also, I often wonder -- again in this small garden, I can't imagine walking up/down a long row tending or harvesting. Usually I pick tomatoes from this patch, then beans from that patch -- mostly within reach or within few steps. If I need to water, fertilize, or spray, the plants are grouped for similar cultural needs (guild).

Hmm. I would imagine that if I had long rows to tend -- OK this is pure speculation on my part -- it might be easier if same or similar plants lined both sides of the path.... :|

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This is great. As we look at gardening as a human task, we begin to see that certain organizations have value to humans that do not hold value for the plants. Likewise we see benefits fro plants that may not be a boon to humans. Somewhere in between lies the best management practice that takes both into account.

Katy has opened an interesting thread that deserves a lot of good thought and some experimentation; I for one will be doing a lot more interplanting this year and starting at least one new bed in a circle to try that. I encourage everyone to try out new planting schemes and report back here...

HG

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HG, word on your last two points. balance, no?


I've got a great reason to use rows when you need them: floating row covers. Not so much for keeping insects off, but to heat the ground and allow for transplantation without hardening off.

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And polytunneling as an adjunct to that thought, toil...


So maybe not a condemnation of rows, just a condemnation of ALWAYS rows...

ANY "always" rule is almost ALWAYS wrong...

Almost... :wink:

HG

paul wheaton
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Sepp Holzer also went to ag school and ended up flushing his education. But now ... it sounds like his farm is infested with students using his property for their doctoral thesis and a variety of other research projects. To hear Holzer talk, the local universities professors would claim that something cannot be done, then enough people would say that Sepp Holzer was doing it, that the prof would pop out to Holzer's place to prove that it isn't really happening, only to be flabbergasted. So, then, all sorts of stuff is done to document what Holzer was doing.

In the early days, Holzer was constantly putting under the microscope and/or running samples through tests. Apparently his lab gear hasn't been touched for over 20 years. He can look at a patch of ground and give you a pretty close idea of the pH. And he can look at an animal and tell you how healthy it is and whether one should be concerned.

So .... science has stopped, and science is moving forward. At least on one permaculture property - THE permaculture property (IMO).

Toil
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you mean formal data collection and analysis has stopped, not science.

certainly not art, the improvement of which is the whole reason for inventing science in the first place.

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For all Fukuoka-san's bluster, I noticed he kept abreast and was able to discuss new findings in pretty knowledgeable detail. He did also prove pretty conclusively you can do without the in-depth knowledge and get the same (or better) results with common sense.

I find it comforting to have some scientific backstopping, but I see it as less and less of a necessity, more like a security blanket that keeps away tigers. No tigers? It's working... :wink: But I do think you must have a grasp of details if you are going to try and convince others over whom science holds a far more powerful sway... I can't see stepping away entirely for that reason, and I suspect it was Fukuoka-san's reason too...

HG

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The way I see it the data collection and analysis is still and always going on now instead of using a microscope to analyze he is using his brain as the instrument of analyzation(sp). Still analyzation just not in a form a formal scientist would admit to.

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It's more than that HG. Science focuses one part the mind. The whole either/or game Mr. Fukuoka fell into is a chimera. His own scientific training was crucial to the way he learned to deal with his world. His myopia was nothing special either. No one is above that. So holding it against him is a waste of time, since we'd have to hold it against everyone, and still listen to someone.

Acquiring scientific understanding does not have to be just about communicating with others (big plus though). It can be about having parallel systems: one that quantifies, defines, and deduces, and another that makes the leaps and associations and pattern recognition common to all animals. Why throw out a million years of evolution in favor of the last 20 thousand or vice versa?

Do you know your weakness? I think mine is fear. I hide behind science. So I'm trying to work on my very strong instinctual side. My dogs are helping a lot but I have a long way to go. And I aim to use my scientific side to get me more in touch with my instinctual side by learning the names and habits of wild plants and hopefully knowing them as characters I can relate to. Science doesn't have to make you a Vulcan.

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Science doesn't have to make you a Vulcan.
You're right. But it does have a tendency to if you don't watch it.

E.G., we were blasting right over OL's head in rocket ships while she was still trying to figure things out. Our knowledge did her no good at all until we distilled it down to some simpler memes. There is a big event at Harvard every year where people present the topics of their paper that they have slaved over for years in a fairly concise fashion, and then give a six word non-scientific presentation. It is pretty laughable, but also informative, because it makes them break it down, put it in context, and suddenly I can suddnely understand what the polysyllabic goop they were just talking about means.

Science forgets itself in this higher order of language somtimes, forgets that for much of science to truly have meaning it must become a socially accepted meme. The climate debate is a fine example of where the scientific community is falling on its collective keister, being drowned out by money with megaphones. The necessity of a shorthand of technical terminology should never override the greater necessity of communicating your thought to the rest of the species.

I am glad we have scientists, and I don't want them to stop doing what they are doing. But I am glad we have Masonobu, and Sepp, and Ruth to tell them to stick it in their eye and show them some new stuff too. Both paradigms hold great value, equal in my mind... They should work together more...

My 2 cents...

HG

paul wheaton
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I think all progress would be accelerated by a factor of 20 if we embraced what I like to call "the language of the engineers" (could be "the language of the scientist" too). Basically, qualifying statements and eliminating fallacy and exaggeration.

Fukuoka and Holzer are innovaters that look five or six big leaps. Fortunately they did do some level of documenation.

I would like to say that Fukuoka and Holzer are following in the steps of Einstein.



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