Vegmonkey and the Mrs.

Due to only having a small space, we have to be exact. Planning what we plant enables us to use the ground twice in one year.

‘Bed One’ housed the Root crops last year, namely carrots, parsnips, onions and leeks. They all grew well but were harvested by the end of the summer which left a bed full of empty ground.

To use up half of the space, we planted ‘Senshyu’ Japanese Onions that would grow overwinter. The idea was that by the time the bed is rotated (it will become the cucurbit bed), the onions will have been harvested and the courgettes, squashes etc will be planted. 

To complicate matters further, we planted Ulster Sceptre in the other half of the bed, a first early type of potato that takes 10 weeks to mature from planting. Again, the thinking was that they would be harvested in time for the courgettes etc to go in.

We planted the potatoes back in mid-March, so by my reckoning, they will be ready for harvesting around the end of May (10 weeks). The Senshyu onions were planted in September and will be ready for harvesting mid-late June. 

The courgettes and squash plants - not too many mind, due to the space - will have been raised in pots from the beginning of May, maybe end of April and will fill the space occupied previously by the onions and potatoes. That will give them a good 3 months in the ground which is plenty to produce a good harvest.

This way, that one bed will produce a decent size crop of onions, potatoes, courgettes and squash in the space of one year. Not bad for a 2 metre square space! I’d be interested to hear how other people use crop rotation to help produce regular crops of veg. This year i’m going to try growing sweetcorn within the cucurbit bed…if the soil allows!

Not only do the onions fill a winter gap where the soil would otherwise be unused, they fit perfectly into the rotation. Bed 1 (for want of a better name!) is the roots bed (houses carrots, parsnips, leeks and onions) which will become the Cucurbit bed next year. I don’t need the half being used by the onions until Late June/Early July, so the onions will sit happily. They will be replaced by a variety of squash, raised in pots and transplanted in later.

When i plant the standard onion sets next year, there will be no less than 200 onions sitting in a space no bigger than 2.5 square metres. Easy as that. Whoever said veg growing wasn’t easy

The most difficult job this winter, and incidentally, one of the most rewarding, is to (realistically) update the planting scheme, without overdoing it.

Has anyone had any bad experiences with Senshyu or other overwintering onions? I don’t mean muggings or bad attitudes! , but pests or problems. A bit of advance warning is never a bad thing.