North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

[Road's End Farm <organic87@frontiernet.net>]

On Jun 27, 2009, at 9:13 PM, fuwa fuwa usagi wrote:

> I have started to get an interest in inter cropping fruit and vegetables.  My first experiment has been planting snow peas (Super Sugar Snap for those who care on the North side of my everbearing raspberries (cut to the ground in spring) in a row oriented east to west.   It seems to work fine.  However I am worried about introducing disease etc to the soil and am wondering what people' thoughts son this are, and if you have particular combinations you have tried (maybe onions planted between strawberries?)

I would think that if anything you would be reducing disease/pest problems, because you'll have unrelated things growing next to each other instead of a solid patch of one thing. However some things do have apparently unrelated hosts. I'd check with Cooperative Extension, and with the neigbors if possible, as to what problems are prevalent in the area; then ask Extension what all the hosts are, and mix in things that aren't hosts with the plants that you're worried about.

Also, be careful where you buy your seed and/or transplants; start your transplants yourself, from clean seed, if possible. There's a commotion right now because apparently the big box stores sold home gardeners all over the Northeast a lot of tomato transplants infected with late blight, and we're now all, commercial and home gardener alike, praying for the weather to dry out. Everyone, if you buy any plants, this or any other year, please make sure that the people you're buying them from know what they're doing and are being careful!

On a more specific intercropping note: I like to plant my garlic where an old strawberry planting just came out, because the strawberries are grown in straw, and the garlic likes all that organic matter buildup in my clay-rich soils. They're not there at the same time, though; this is more of a succession trick. I've heard of planting garlic around peach trees to discourage borers; when I tried this the garlic didn't do much, but there were grasses as well as garlic present, which might have been the problem. Also, maybe I planted the garlic too close to the trunk -- this was years ago -- you might try just outside the drip line for less shading.

I also have perennial herbs next to orchard trees, partly to help keep the beneficial insect encouraged.

--Rivka
Finger Lakes NY; zone 5 mostly