Three sisters 2025

Last years' sisters were quite a success. So I decided to do it again, also because I incorporated a lot more corn into our diet. So I wanted to go a bit bigger and the fava beans were still in the place I had the sisters last year. I made a roughly 4x4 m patch (12"x12").

So I needed to break some land. It did hurt a bit to dig into the lush green grass and turn it over.



But the soil was very sandy, easy digging and hardly any topsoil or life to be found



Did a double dig, that is remove the grass, dig one step further down, throw the grass roots up in the ditch and cover with the soil that was dig #2 before.



Making sure the top layer doesn't have too many roots



Digging is done




Getting some biochar from the kontiki




Spread 3 bags of biochar to add some organic matter




Also added 3 bags of 1 year old manure




Raked it all in




Planted 18 groups of 4 maize and 18 groups of 4-5 squash. When the corn is about a foot high I'll add some beans.




Finished putting in irrigation pipes




And thanks to the rain the past 2 weeks the short term cover of arugula is sprouting

I think you did an incredible job. Look at the color of that soil after you amended it! You can be proud of a garden that looks like that.

Do you have the specifics of the types of corn and squash you are planting? Any particular reason why you planted them?

Very much look forward to watching this thread!

I also plan a 3-sisters garden with a thread like last year. This will be my third full-on 3 sisters, and second with no fertilizers.

We need to form a guild of 3-sisters and all post trials and tribulations, what works and doesn't, advantages and disadvantages.

Hey Timothy,
thanks for the encouraging words. The color is mostly from the charcoal. We'll see how happy the plants are going to be.

I planted Wapsie Walley Dent Corn, Glass Gem Corn, Tiny black popcorn corn, Martian Jewels, "Asturias Harina", a selection of mostly red kernels from last year, a selection of big yellow ones from last year.
I chose the red ones because I like the way they look. And the big yellow ones because they nixtamalize easily. Apart from that I'm just experimenting and looking for interesting crosses.
Squash I planted include: Butternut (one local and one amish), a swamp squash from NOLA, something called a Sicilian Giant, local butternut look-alike called a Cacahuete (which menas peanut) and some luffa. We'll see who out-competes the others.

Hey Tom,
I'm looking forward to seeing your thread too.

Maybe we can start a thread that gathers all the 3 sisters threads? That would be a good start I guess.

Are there many already out there?