should proceed with care. In this combination, the beans
must be bush beans, since pole beans and beets do not
grow well together. Also, pole beans have been reported
to pull the ears o5 corn stalks. Sometimes pole beans
have been grown successfully with corn, however, and a
vegetable such as carrots may be substituted for the beets
so you can use the tall beans. When di5erent plants are
grown together, you sacrice some of the living mulch
advantage to companion planting “in space” because of
the di5erent plant heights. One way to determine the
spacing for different plants grown together is to add their
spacing together and divide by 2. If you grow corn and
beets together, add 15 inches and 4 inches for a total of
19 inches. Divide by 2 and you get a per-plant spacing of
9½ inches. The beets, then, would be 9½ inches from
each corn plant and vice versa. Each corn plant will be
19 inches from each corn plant and most beet plants will
be 9½ inches from the other beet plants nearest to them.
In the drawing below, note that each corn plant gets the
7½ inches in each direction that it requires for a total
growing area with a diameter of 15 inches. Each beet
plant, at the same time, gets the 2 inches it requires in
each direction for a growing space with a 4-inch
diameter.
A spacing example for 3 crops grown together—corn
(a heavy feeder), bush beans (a heavy giver), and beets (a
light feeder)—is given on this page. You should note that
this approach to companion planting in space uses more
bush bean and beet plants than corn plants. Be sure to
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(Brent)
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