Three Sisters Garden year 3, 2025

Another few hours weeding and planting today. Half a dozen squash, a dozen cantaloupe hills, and about 200 beans. I put one bean seed in each corn hill that didn't already have one growing.

I found cans of old seeds, soy, cantaloupe, and beans. Those got broadcast on top of the garden. Live or die! I do that every few years and usually get something out of it. Beans in particular do well broadcast.

I found a few volunteer beans growing. Also quite a lot of volunteer marigold, which made me happy.

Another hour and a half weeding today. Just about got all the taller weeds whacked down, and started a little bit of hilling around the corn.

Not really hilling as much as adding a layer on top the soil. This May has been quite dry, a single good rain 1.5 inches all month. So, worried about oncoming drought. Layering the soil limits water wicking up and evaporative loss from the surface. Even a thin 'dust mulch' really helps a lot in dry years.

Once the corn is a few inches taller, and the other seeds have well sprouted I'll really start hilling, and also adding straw and mulch around the plants. Maybe two weeks from now. What I really need now is a good deep rainfall to get the other seeds sprouted and the corn growing!

Bees, a new hive I started today:

I cut down a patch of sunchokes and plant corn and squash seeds under the residues. We had near 20" of rain in the last two months and more is coming. The thick layer of mulch will break down quickly.

May Lotito wrote:I cut down a patch of sunchokes and plant corn and squash seeds under the residues. We had near 20" of rain in the last two months and more is coming. The thick layer of mulch will break down quickly.

Do the sunchokes grow back from the roots?

20 inches of rain! Send some to me. We've had 1.5 inches in the last month. Fortunately it's been cool, so there is still some moisture in the top layer, but still! Hoping the predicted rain on Tuesday is a good one. Nothing growing appears to be suffering yet, but also a lot hasn't sprouted yet due to the low moisture.

I put in a few more squash seeds and in the morning plan to plant some more, plus cantaloupes and whatever else looks good at the moment. Spotted a volunteer tomato this morning, one of the few so far.

I let the sunchokes grow until the tubers are exhausted and rotten but the stolons haven't started forming. The stalks are firm enough to be pulled off the ground entirely, leaving nothing to regrow.  Unwanted sunchokes can be eradicated this way. While in this spot, small tubers were planted densly as spring cover crop to manage the nutrients. We had twice the amount of average rainfall but I am preparing for a drier and hotter summer.

Finally got some rain. And more forecast for tonight. Yesterday I planted the last squash seeds, and piles and piles of cantaloupe and some watermelon.
I am happy to see that some old seeds that I put in pots are actually sprouting. I wondered if they were too old to have good germination, but it appears no problem. So hopefully all that stuff in the garden will sprout too now that we have some rain.

Corn starting to look decent, the rain really helped and it's raining a bit more right now. Quite a bit of bug and deer damage.

Seeds planted in pots are sprouting well, but right in the ground I am still waiting on. Hopefully a few more days. A few of the squash are sprouting but no cantaloupes yet. Really need some heat, but i's been a cool spring.
Hill of corn. I will remove some extras to end up with 3 or 4 total stalks per hill. Last year I tried more stalks per hill, and quite a few of then were puny, so this year am trying fewer to see how it goes. Letting the extras grow for now in case bugs or deer do the thinning for me.

Hill with beans and squash and corn:

Corn sprouts from re-planted hill. Lots of poor germination or destroyed sprouts this year so lots of re-planting. Pollination may be uneven!

Volunteer tobacco. Some grow back every year and I let a few grow. Beautiful flowers on an impressive plant. Very tough and easy to grow:

One week later, almost all corn and squash seeds have sprouted.

May Lotito wrote:One week later, almost all corn and squash seeds have sprouted.

Happy!

Germination seems retarded this year, everything slow to sprout. Generally cool this year especially at night. I did spot a few cantaloupe and squash sprouts today. And the re-planted corn is sprouting well.

I like how others are adding their experiences with 3 sisters in this thread as well!

Riona Abhainn wrote:I like how others are adding their experiences with 3 sisters in this thread as well!

Everyone is welcome! Post pics. Post comments. Criticisms. Questions and experiences.

I am lazy taking pics this year. Spent over an hour yesterday hilling corn and chopping weeds. Seeing lots more squash and cantaloupe sprouts. Since rain is scant this year everything is getting layers of pulled weeds, dirt and hay layered on top, especially the squash and cantaloupe.

We got 1.5 inches of rain in May and so far in June 1.6 inches. That is just barely enough to keep things green and growing. Under the mulch the soil is still moist. Moist enough that seeds are still sprouting.

Chatting with a work friend. She was complaining that she couldn't find any organic corn seeds in the local stores. I said not to worry, I have a box full of seeds in my car. So after work we left together and I gave her a handful of my purple corn and also a few cobs of sweet corn. Her husband is an organic food fanatic, and she expected he would be excited by the purple sweet corn. They are Nigerian, and initially she was reluctant to grow colored corn. Their traditional corn is white.

Did two sessions in the garden today, about an hour each. That was plenty, temp 91 degrees, high humidity. Spent most of that time clearing weeds and hilling the corn. It's dry and a lot of it is starting to curl leaves. Needs mulch. Working on that but it's slow going.
Dry corn from a spot that isn't hilled yet.

Potatoes look good though:

Properly hilled.

I hope your friend and her husband end up loving the corn you gave her to grow even though its a new variety for her!

Been putting in a lot of work in the garden the last few days. 2 days ago I spend 3 hours in 92 degree heat (33 C) planting cantaloupe and watermelons. It took a lot longer than I had expected because the area I planned to use was all weeds, and I had to clear off areas. It was dig, plant, drink water, dig etc. Thankfully my summer heat resilience has returned! This was not in my 3-sisters garden area.

In the 3-sisters garden I am trying to get caught up on hilling, weeding and spreading straw mulch. Plan to take photos today. The corn mostly looks pretty good, just enough rain to keep it growing. About half is showing signs of nutrient deficiencies, pale green for N. Striped leaves which the internet tells me can be zinc, magnesium or sulfur deficiencies. Partly that may be weed competition.

The last few days I planted some leftover cantaloupe, okra and strawberry plants between the corn rows. Strawberries took over one of my flower/herb gardens so I yanked them out and stuck them in wherever I saw bare dirt. Some may grow.

Viney plants finally looking good. Squash are growing, and cantaloupes from seeds finally looking like they might grow. A few watermelons. I didn't plan to plant any zucchini here, but sure enough there is one for sure and maybe a few more. Not super happy with that, was hoping for all kabocha squash. Weirdly, it's a bush type zucchini, which I have not grown for several years. No idea where that came from.

Time to plant more bean seeds. Extra beans go in anywhere it looks like the squash etc. ground cover will not end up 100%. Goal is to have viney crops over every inch of the garden. Usually a lot of this is tomatoes, but this year not seeing very many volunteer tomatoes.

Thom Bri wrote:Some plants in the garden. Most of this won't get weeded much. Either they die off soon, or they are low-lying plants that won't compete for sunlight. It will be interesting to see how well the stuff I plant does with the competition. ANything that gets too tall will be cut back.

Is that a yellow dock/curly dock?

Suzette Thib wrote:

Thom Bri wrote:Some plants in the garden. Most of this won't get weeded much. Either they die off soon, or they are low-lying plants that won't compete for sunlight. It will be interesting to see how well the stuff I plant does with the competition. ANything that gets too tall will be cut back.

Is that a yellow dock/curly dock?

Not sure the exact species. I am weak on weeds. My daughter downloaded a plant ID ap to my phone this spring and I have used it a few times, then I forget what it told me!

Weakest-looking hill of corn. Pretty yellow but it looked worse earlier.

One of the better hills, about waist-high. Better dirt there. Beans starting to climb. A few are flowering already.

Nutrient deficiency, striped leaves:

Down one row

The whole thing:

Here is what my area looks like 4 weeks after planting. A dozen beans are growing among corns. And the Morado corns are having tassels poking up already!

May Lotito wrote:Here is what my area looks like 4 weeks after planting. A dozen beans are growing among corns. And the Morado corns are having tassels poking up already!

No tassels yet. Last year with near-perfect weather there were tassels on a few stalks at 55 days.

This year with drought I have seen no signs of tassels, and much of the corn is still very short. Even the farmer's hybrid corn is rolling its leaves this year. 2.7 inches of rain for June, with temps frequently in the 90s. I am surprised the corn looks so good actually.

Last year the Morado corns were the only one out of three varieties to produce mature seeds. The other two grew tall with more leaves and got caught up with diseases or deficiency before the ears were done. I let my chickens have them. On Bakercreek website, there are two good reviews and one is reporting small plants. I planted both original and harvested morado corn seeds in April in a less fertile spot. They are all the same, tasseled at 6-8 leaves and manage to grow tiny ears with normal kernels. I am wondering if this variety is sensitive to soil nutrition status early on and is able to make decision accordingly. In the wild, it would be the survivor as no one would be feeding throughout the season.

The purple colors are supposed to be protective against environmental stresses, from drought to diseases to insects. You can google scholar anthocyanins if you have an interest.

54 days from planting to first tassels today. Last year was 55.

Pretty miserable looking garden. Some of it, maybe a quarter, looks fine. At least another quarter to 1/3 is severely stunted due to ongoing drought. I doubt even good rains now will recover that portion very much. 2 issues. One is that a lot of one area needed replanting when something destroyed the sprouts or seeds. That replanted area looks poor. The second issue is soil. A large part of that garden has poorer soil, heavy clay with low nutrients that always looks worse.

But the good portion looks as tall and robust as even the local hybrid corn in fields nearby. I should get a decent harvest in spite of the drought. Praying for rain.

One pic is a green plant and the other is a purple plant.

How tall is your corn, as the 4th is in 2 days

I have mini white pumpkins and fava beans, but no corn.  My favas are flowering and my pumpkins are getting big and can't share a pot anymore, so I'll transfer one out tomorrow night.

Riona Abhainn wrote:How tall is your corn, as the 4th is in 2 days

I have mini white pumpkins and fava beans, but no corn.  My favas are flowering and my pumpkins are getting big and can't share a pot anymore, so I'll transfer one out tomorrow night.

Tallest is nearly head high, maybe 5 feet. The droughty areas are 1-2 feet.
No squash yet, though some is flowering. A few small zucchinis. No beans yet.

A few shots of the messy backyard garden. My wife calls it 'the jungle'. She prefers neat rows. Except a row of green peppers in the front and along the back, there ate NO ROWS. Most seeds were broadcast, and lots of flower seeds.

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My corns are showing calcium deficiency, which is what the local soil is. Usually other kinds of weird symptoms will dissappear when calcium is adequate and roots are strong. I give them some gypsum. If you have dandelion and chicory, your soil is good.

ETA. I prepared another bed to try the mountain morado corn one more time. I cut down the cover crop and broadcasted gypsum.  Seeds were planted dry without presoaking and no additional nutrient during the season.

Call the 'jungle' a milpa for the cache of travel-wise sophistication!

May Lotito wrote:My corns are showing calcium deficiency, which is what the local soil is. Usually other kinds of weird symptoms will dissappear when calcium is adequate and roots are strong. I give them some gypsum. If you have dandelion and chicory, your soil is good.

No shortage of dandelions or chicory!

It got gypsum 2 years ago, but not a lot. I see the streaks in some early corn most years, but it disappears as the corn matures. I think it's in large part stress. A few good rains and the streaks will go away.

Christopher Weeks wrote:Call the 'jungle' a milpa for the cache of travel-wise sophistication!

It's milpa-max.
If I cared about production I wouldn't do it this way. Too much stuff too close together to really produce much. But I'll get enough zucchini and beans, lots of flowers, and a few sweet corn. It's just for funs and see what happens.