I have often heard of the 3 Sisters but have never had the opportunity to try it. You raise another question in my mind Steven...For those of us with minimal planting space, what would be considered a good starting number of guilds for suitable polination to occur? I had not even considered that angle but it is a must isn't it? I would also love to see some photos as I have only heard "fables" of sister plants but have never seen it in action.

Maybe OldGardener will take some pics this year and show off her garden of Three Sisters.

Funny isn't it. ATP was responsible for me finally starting taking photos too. I used to hate cameras but I love it all now.

Hello, a funny thing happens when my wife takes photos, she takes 5 and ends up with 6 after editing.
I use fairly intense plantings too, instead of a couple of rows of bush beans, I plant a column of 3 staggered rows about 9"s wide. It grows like a hedge. Next to the bean hedge I plant broccoli, cabbage, and marigolds, with a column of beets. many times I add a few celosia for color. I plant onions freely amoung the cole plants away from the beans. Next to my Asparagus I usually plant herbs like coriander and basil with a row of sunflowers. My sweet potatoes are usually next separating my gladiolus border. I do my radishes and carrots in a raised bed adding turnips after the radishes. I grow my cukes with hyacinth beans on the trellis of the small gazabo. Small rows of lettuce and spinach can be found here and there. I leave old lettuce go to seed for the finches. Last year I built a raised strawberry bed with a soaker hose under the mulch. I move my tomato wall each year, it consist of 2 painted panels of concrete reinforcement wire mounted on 2 fence post with the plants trained up between them. Since my garden soil has been amended with compost and manure for so many years all I have to do is turn it with a fork, cultivating is usually done with a hoe. My potatoes I raise in containers, cut down plastic drums. I am thinking of moving my containers and trying the 3 sisters in that corner.

I love it!!! Perfect timing to give other gardeners ideas.

That's great you have a space planned for trying the three sisters.

Is that the asparagus in the first photo with the straw? I'm trying to figure out where to plant some starts. It looks like it gets pretty tall.

Stunning. Lots of good ideas there for me.

Yes it is asparagus, the ferns grow to 4', I have since planted the foreground of that row with Landreth Purple Passion Asparagus I picked up at the Philly Flower Show last year.
http://www.landrethseeds.com/c...
as you can see below, I use long bamboo poles tied to stakes to contain it as well as the glads, I just slide them up as needed. Here are a few shots of the new strawberry bed in process as well. As you can also see I use old carpet cut into runners for the paths, it helps avoid mud, soil compaction, and weeds. I add as much as 1-2 cu. yds of compost and rotted manure per year. The only tilling I've had to do is with a Mantis, to mix in the compost and ground limestone to offset the acid. Since we have such heavy red clay sections get double dug to ensure drainage, the older I get the less often this happens. :lol:
The little gazebo was built from recovered chestnut used in the 20's- 30's to build a carriage and horse barn on an alley in Mechanicsburg, Pa. Instead of garages, they had small stables. After the chestnut blight took hold in the late 20's, chestnut was cut freely and used widely for construction and finish work. The ghost forest in the Blue Ridge Skyway are/ were dead chestnut.

I like the idea of carpet for paths. There are pathways of small sharp pebbles here from the previous owner. They drive mad. You can't walk on them in bare feet and the paths are poorly placed and take me where I don't want to go. They also take up valuable planting area and should be somewhere else. I could also roll them up when the daylilies start flowering.

Glen, The carpet works really well, soft on the knees when planting and weeding, holds moisture in, stops weeds, reduces compaction, and is moveable as you change plantings from year to year. The best part is it's free! Just stop by a job site and haul it home, all I'm doing is giving it a delay in route to the landfill. Before we had a bad experience with a squash bug epidemic a few years ago, I'd roll out a small room size carpet and plant my cantaloupes through the carpet. No weeds and healthy rinds. It also gave you a defined out-
line to pull stray vines into.

Instead of corn, you could use Sunflowers for the support.

Great idea Anderwood.

I think that's a great idea too. Sunflowers make great support for vines. Last year I grew some cucumbers on a trellis and sunflowers nearby - the cucumbers grew up the sunflowers. I didn't even need the trellis.

The problem with corn is that it's wind pollenated and also by bees so unless you can be sure noone in over a mile is growing corn it will cross this results in useless seed for saving. çorn is almost all gmo unless heirloom so this further complicated things gmo pollen kills bees


Back when native people did the three sisters they had alot more space then we do today and the corn was probably used as flint not sweet. not to say its a bad combo just not very realistic unless you live in a rural area or have lots of land

Wild flowers, I love the sunflower as a trellis idea. Three sisters concept also works as a complete protein with all amino acids being offered by the trio. Cool stuff!

Never mind the GMO factor; the concept is based on harvesting corn for corn meal, and dry beans, not sweet corn and green beans. So everything is harvested at the end of the season, the dry corn, dry beans, and squash. Which is not to say they aren't all good companion plants otherwise, but harvesting can be a bit challenging, to say the least...

Thanks all for the good info.

ElRancho, thank you for reminding me to use the sunflowers as a trellis; I'm planning on growing some Mammoth sunflowers this year!

Actually, it's getting close to seed sowing time (wintersowing in Texas is February- short wintersowing! ) and I have lots of ideas and seeds to get started.

I tried the 3 sisters last year. It worked pretty well except the corn was not as vigorous as hoped. I planted a bantam, I think they were blue lake green beans, and butternut squash. The corn had small ears but was usable, the beans were good, and the squash made fine creamy soup . I want to try again but will use sunflowers this time.

I grow pole beans and pole limas on teepees and trombone squash on trellises, but corn doesn't do well for me. Funny because I'm in Illinois -- a corn state. I do have good luck with Indian corn. With sweet corn being so cheap and plentiful at the market in the summertime, seems like a waste of space in my postage stamp garden. Here's some pics of my small urban vertical garden. I've been gardening in this same spot since 1990. Moved in summer 1989 and the garden was already planted by former residents. I have changed it up quite a bit over the years. It doesn't look like the same space.

Greenbrain, your vines and trellises look great!!

greenbrain, What a nice garden.