Three Sisters and Netafim

Long ago, the Native Americans had gardens. They didn’t have Google to check how to do things; they had generations of experience. And experience taught them that the three staples of their garden – squash, beans and corn – needed to be planted together.

In fact, these three plants have such a close relationship, that they call them Three Sisters. So a few years ago, we decided to try a Three Sisters garden. It was such a success that, each year, we’ve made the garden bigger.

These three plants form a wonderful symbiotic relationship. The corn is the basis because of the calories and food value it provides. It is also a trellis for the beans, but it sucks nitrogen from the soil. The beans are a nitrogen fixer which improves the fertility of the soil for the next year’s planting. Bean vines also help stabilize the corn so they don’t blow over so easily in the wind. Never mind that there were never any Native American tribes that settled in the Cheyenne area – which ought to tell us something. But if they had, the beans would have helped their corn stay partially upright.

The squash is the mulch. I weed and hoe the garden about three times, then the squash vines take over. They keep the weeds down and the soil moisture up. The spines on the squash plants are supposed to keep predators away, but the only predators we had were grasshoppers and they didn’t seem to care if there were spines or not.

We’ve found that squash vines, bean vines, and corn stalks don’t compost well. But they make a dandy bonfire at the end of the season. I’m sure the Native Americans just dug the vines and stalks back into the soil, which was great if you live in the eastern half of the North American continent or in the desert southwest. However, it takes much longer to compost things on the high plains of Wyoming.

More cool stuff: Corn, beans and squash complement each other nutritionally. Corn provides carbohydrates, the dried beans are rich in protein, balancing the lack of amino acids found in corn. Finally, squash has vitamins from the fruit (all those little beta-carotenes) and the oil from the seeds.

The Native Americans did not plant in rows – that’s part of our European OCD heritage – they planted in mounds. They would plant the corn in a mound, let it come up till it’s about 4” or so, weed the garden then plant the beans right next to the corn. Then the squash would go in hills between the corn plants.

I tried the mounds the first few years, and they worked ok. I thought it was too hard to weed and hoe. This year, though, I tried a different way. When Walt tilled the garden, he tilled in straight rows. I planted the corn and beans together in a row. So three corn seeds with three bean seeds, move down the row about 12” and plant more beans and corn. The next row over would be squash or pumpkins. I didn’t plant in hills, just rows. Then, a row of corn/beans, then a row of squash, etc.

I had three varieties of corn – two early sweet corn varieties (which were fabulously yummy!) and the decorative corn.

I did one bean variety – a pretty cranberry colored dried bean.

And I planted squash – acorn, kabocha, butternut and buttercup. The butternut didn’t do as well as the other three. Pumpkins – jack o’lantern, and two kinds of pie pumpkins. They all did great. We planted the zucchini on the edge of the garden after a row of corn. Zucchini always does well. Very, very well.

Next year, I will continue to plant in rows, but I’ll hill the squash and pumpkins in the rows between the corn.

 

To prepare the garden, we till it in the fall to knock down any grass or leftover weeds. In the spring, we till it again, then spread compost all over the bed and lightly till that in. We still don’t have a great irrigation system. I’d love to do Netafim, but I’ve got to save up for that because it’s such a big bed. Instead we had a rotating sprinkler on tall legs. Wastes water and doesn’t get the water where it needs to go – the roots. Next year – Netafim.

I guess this is a good place as any to describe Netafim. This is a drip irrigation system – I found that it was developed in Israel – that is self-draining and self-cleaning. All I know is, it works great. It’s easy to put together for whatever garden you are irrigating. We have raised beds and just-on-the-dirt beds that we use with Netafim. It doesn’t degrade in the sun or cold – we keep it on the gardens year around. Each Netafim garden is on a timer, so I don’t have to haul hoses.

Plants like drip-irrigation. It conserves water, water goes straight to the roots, you don’t get the diseases that watering the leaves can allow, and it helps in windy, dry, poor soil climates. Oh, that’s Cheyenne.

It’s a bit of a search to find a distributer of Netafim, but it’s so worth it. But any kind of drip irrigation works better than a sprinkler.

Back to the Three Sisters bed:  these plants love sun – lots of it. There is one edge of our garden that’s in the shade and the plants come up about 4” and stop. It’s a nice science experiment, but I’ll put spinach or something in that shady area next year.

 

This garden is one of our favorite spots because everything just works together so nicely. And I love pumpkins.