Three Sisters Planting

     Many of the agricultural tribes of Americas practiced what they called “The Three Sisters” planting.  This was a method of companion planting using their three staples:  corn, beans, and squash.  These three crops where planted together and created a symbiotic relation between the plants.   This is how Wikipedia explains it:

    The three crops benefit by being grown together.[5][4] The cornstalk serves as a trellis for the beans to climb; the beans fix nitrogen in the soil and their twining vines stabilize the maize in high winds; and the wide leaves of the squash plant shade the ground, keeping the soil moist and helping prevent the establishment of weeds.[7][8] The prickly hairs of some squash varieties deter pests, such as deer and raccoons.

    I have always been curious about how the Three Sisters method works and this year I tried out a bit of it my garden.  I didn’t really do it exactly the same way, because I didn’t plant squash, just the corn and beans.   I failed to mound the corn rows and planted them too close together.  Also, the type of corn (Black corn) and the bean varieties I used were new to me, and probably not suitable for growing in our northern climate.

    The resulting plants look a bit chaotic in the photo above.  The vining beans did seem to pull over a lot of the corn stalks, and I haven’t yet checked on how well the final produce faired.  It has not yet fully matured.

    The Three Sisters method seems to make some sense, and I may try it again more religiously next year, if I get any suitable results.  In the photo below you can see the red ear of the corn and some of the bean pods.

    

Take a look at my paintings:  davidmarchant2.ca