What crop can be planted after carrots?
Almost every gardener knows that it is not worth planting carrots in the same area, because after the harvest season the land loses its useful components and becomes poor. But every summer resident has his own secrets about the proper cultivation of vegetables. Such knowledge comes with experience, and it is about them that we will tell.
How to plan?
In order for carrots to grow well, it is necessary to choose soils of light or medium loam that are fertile. We also note that carrots have a negative attitude towards fresh organic matter and cannot tolerate sowing density. For growth, it is necessary to periodically loosen the soil and regularly water the site. If you observe such nuances, then in the end you will collect a ripe, even, and most importantly, tasty and vitamin-rich root crop.
In order to get a lot of harvest, it is necessary to pay attention not only to the variety, to proper care and fertile soil, but also to crop rotation.
Crop rotation is the alternation of different plant species in one area with a period of 4 years. Thus, it turns out that one plant in one area should not be planted every season.
For example:
- do not plant plants of a similar species and even family in one area;
- if you plant the same type of plant on the site for the next season, then the sprouts may be affected by the same disease as the previous type;
- it is not recommended to plant plants on the site that require other care.
Then why sow?
Carrots will not give a rich harvest the next year if they are planted in a garden where umbrella plants grew. The beds after cucumbers, tomatoes, cabbage and zucchini are ideal for growing carrots.
Also, the carrot itself, having given up its harvest, is an excellent predecessor for many crops.
After it, you can sow:
- tomatoes, eggplants, peppers or potatoes;
- cabbage, as it allows the soil to rest and restore its useful qualities;
- beans, peas and other leguminous plants;
- garlic and onions, as they disinfect the soil;
- radish, which has a high ripening rate.
Even in the garden after carrots, you can plant perennial berries, which include strawberries and strawberries.
Green manure, which include mustard, rye and oats, will quickly and perfectly restore the quality of the land after carrots.
It is possible to sow carrots on the same plot after 4 seasons.
Almost all summer residents know that carrots have a negative attitude towards manure being applied to the beds. If an inexperienced gardener did not take this fact into account, but first fertilized the soil, then it is better to plant other plants in this place - for example, cucumbers, onions, cabbage or potatoes. But carrots can be planted in this place next season. Manure negatively affects the quality of carrots, its appearance, shelf life.
In the land fertilized with manure, different crops can be planted in place of carrots.
- Cucumbers. Such plants do not grow in the ground, but outside. In order for vegetables to give a lot of crops, fertilizers must be applied to the ground, which is used as manure. Also, manure restores the fertility of the soil, which was depleted after the root crop.
- Tomatoes, peppers, eggplant or cabbage.Such vegetables are ideal for planting a carrot field in the garden, as they do not need nutritious soil. As for cabbage, it allows the soil to rest.
- Bean plants. These crops enrich the soil with useful substances.
- You can also plant radishes. Although the radish is a root crop, it ripens quickly, due to which it got into this list.
What to plant in one garden?
Making the right choice of plants that can be planted next to carrots will help care for and preserve the crop. Thus, if you plant onions or garlic near a bed with carrots, they will scare off a pest, such as a carrot fly, with their smell. And the neighborhood of carrots with onions is doubly useful, since carrots also perform the function of protecting against pests that can attack onions.
The orange root vegetable grows well next to legumes, tomatoes and herbs. It is not recommended to plant carrots near apple trees, because this will affect not only the taste of carrots, but also apples. Carrots will not grow well after parsley.
Excellent growth rates can be noted after tomatoes, eggplant, zucchini, cucumbers, onions, garlic and various greens.
Thus, we can say with confidence that this root crop is unpretentiously related to the "neighbors".
Crop rotation scheme
Crop rotation is used to improve the soil by planting some plants, which alternate with others each season. If such manipulation is carried out in compliance with the rules, then every year you can get a rich harvest. Any vegetable or herb affects the quality of the crop next year, since they all take the necessary useful components from the soil, and thus impoverish the land.Also, the quality of the land can be affected by pests that attack crops.
Consider the basic rules of crop rotation.
- In order to get a high yield, instead of crops with large roots, plants with smaller ones are planted for the next season. But you should not perform such a manipulation in reverse.
- If the crops are medium late, then they must be planted earlier. This is justified by the fact that the longer the plant grows, the more time the earth needs to fully recover.
- In place of vegetables that may be subject to certain diseases and pests, vegetables are planted for the next season that are not susceptible to such diseases. If you do the opposite, pests will appear with enviable regularity.
- In the autumn, after harvesting, the soil must be prepared for the next season. For such preparation, it is necessary to dig up the site and feed it with all the substances that were taken by the plants. For example, after harvesting beets, potatoes and carrots, the land will be depleted and, in order to restore it, it needs fertilizer, which includes phosphorus and nitrogen.
- It is not recommended to plant a similar type of vegetable in one place earlier than after 4 years. It is during this period that the soil will pick up all the necessary substances for excellent growth and a high level of productivity of the same carrots.
- Also, do not forget about the neighborhood of plants with carrots. Such factors affect yields - for example, carrots will grow poorly next to cabbages, but will give an excellent harvest near onions and peas.
- In order not to confuse all the subtleties of gardening, it is recommended to make a site plan and mark on it which plants were planted and when, and what further after them can be planted in this place.
Tips & Tricks
In order to get a high yield of the crop, you should not rely only on crop rotation.
It is also necessary to adhere to some rules and recommendations that are distinguished by experienced agronomists.
- Carrots should not be planted in places where a slight shadow sometimes appears.
- For planting carrots, it is better to choose a site with light and fertile soil, which includes sandy and loamy soil with an average level of acidity.
- Although it is believed that carrots are a frost-resistant root crop, moist soil is necessary for its development after planting.
- Soil preparation for planting such a root crop must be carried out in the fall, and for this a good solution would be to saturate the soil with all the useful substances that carrots will begin to pick up in the spring. It is important to use organic fertilizers - humus or compost.
- In the spring, a week before sowing the seeds, it is recommended to water the site abundantly and cover with a film.
- Since carrots are a vegetable that has a low germination rate, it is recommended to use only fresh seeds.
- After planting the seeds, it is necessary to carry out regular, but moderate watering - if there is too much moisture, the seeds will begin to rot, and the future root crop will turn out to be deformed. And if the carrots have not been watered for a long time and there was a severe drought, then the fruits will crack and coarsen. At the end, you will get nothing more than hard vegetables that do not have good taste.
- When caring for a crop, you can not use fresh manure to feed the site, as carrots have a negative attitude to such fertilizer.
If you follow all of the above recommendations, you can get a good harvest not only of carrots, but also of those crops that grow next to it.
Reviews
On thematic forums, you can often see the opinions of gardeners with different experiences. Most of them still tend to believe that it is necessary to follow all the rules of crop rotation in order to get a good harvest. Almost all summer residents agree that the best idea would be to plant carrots on the site every four years, constantly changing the planting site. It is also necessary to take into account the fact that not all varieties of plants can be planted after carrots, and carrots themselves do not treat all “neighbors” “with understanding”.
Some farmers experimented and tried to sow the same area with carrots the next year. Or planted crops that are not suitable for this variety of vegetables. Unfortunately, most of these experiments have not been successful. Gardeners claim that even if the seeds grew healthy in the first year, the next years the harvest was too small or there was none at all.
The next video talks about crop rotation.