In agriculture, succession planting refers to several planting methods that increase crop availability during a growing season by making efficient use of space and timing.
There are four basic approaches, that can also be combined:
- Two or more crops in succession: After one crop is harvested, another is planted in the same space. The length of the growing season, climate, and crop selection are key factors. For example, a cool season spring crop could be followed by a heat-loving summer crop.
- Same crop, successive plantings: Several smaller plantings are made at timed intervals, rather than all at once. The plants mature at staggered dates, establishing a continuous harvest over an extended period. Lettuce and other salad greens are common crops for this approach.
- Two or more crops simultaneously: Non-competing crops, often with different maturity dates, are planted together in various patterns. Intercropping is one pattern approach; companion planting is a related, complementary practice.
- Same crop, different maturity dates: Several varieties are selected, with different maturity dates: early, main season, late. Planted at the same time, the varieties mature one after the other over the season.
These techniques can be used to design complex, highly productive cropping systems. The more involved the plan, the more detailed knowledge is required, of the specific varieties and how they perform in a particular growing location.
The term "succession planting" usually appears in literature for home gardening and small-scale farming, although the techniques apply to any scale. Some definitions include one or more, but not all of the four techniques described above.
Succession planting is often used in organic farming. Multiple cropping describes essentially the same general method. A catch crop refers to a specific type of succession planting, where a fast-growing crop is grown simultaneously with, or between successive plantings of, a main crop.
Famous quotes containing the words succession and/or planting:
“The heart of man ever finds a constant succession of passions, so that the destroying and pulling down of one proves generally to be nothing else but the production and the setting up of another.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)
“The mode of clearing and planting is to fell the trees, and burn once what will burn, then cut them up into suitable lengths, roll into heaps, and burn again; then, with a hoe, plant potatoes where you can come at the ground between the stumps and charred logs; for a first crop the ashes suffice for manure, and no hoeing being necessary the first year. In the fall, cut, roll, and burn again, and so on, till the land is cleared; and soon it is ready for grain, and to be laid down.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)