I thought it was about time that I gave you all an update regarding the three sisters method that I was trying out for the first time this year.
The sweetcorn has so far done the best out of all three of the crops, it’s grown to nearly 6 foot high and produced lovely sized cobs which are ready for picking. The tassels on the ends have turned brown and after picking one today I was greeted with a beautiful yellow colour. So before they start to over mature I’m going to pick them all this weekend, blanche them and then freeze them to be used over Winter.
The climbing French beans have been a bit of a disaster and the main problem was me… The thing with beans is that they need constant picking, if you let them over mature and go to seed too early then they will stop producing and that is what happened here. I guess it’s my own fault for going away to Wales every month but I only managed to get one huge harvest from them this year. Another problem with the beans is the accessibility, they climbed the sweetcorn beautifully but they were extremely hard to get to and pick.
Last but not least is the Squash ‘Crown Prince’ that was planted in the centre of the three sisters. It’s been a little slow growing which might have been caused by the lack of sunshine on it, however it’s started to produce tiny squashes which I’m hoping will make it before it gets too cold. The plan is to harvest the corn and then chop them down, leaving the roots to put nutrients back into the soil which the squash will thrive on. That way the squash can get that extra piece of sunlight that might help it grow quicker and fingers crossed I’ll get to harvest one!
And that is my three sisters experiment… It’s been neither successful or a disappointment right now but only time will tell. If the squash makes it then it was worth growing all three together and if I had picked the beans more frequently then the harvest would have been bigger. Not that I should be complaining, my plot is so small that I’m grateful for all the harvests I can get!
6 thoughts on “The Three Sisters Update”
Lovely update thank you for sharing have a blessed day
Thank you Linda
Katie, you can probably eat that corn as soon as you pick it. The modern varieties are so sweet and tender that I have often eaten them in this way. The corn I buy from a store I can eat this way because it retains enough of those qualities even days after being picked. Once I helped raise an experimental variety for a big agriculture company. I ate some raw right off the stalk. It was actually so sweet that I could not finish despite my sweet tooth. The cob was 17 inches long and 14 inches around. That might have been part of the reason I couldn’t finish it, but at the first bite, I was somewhat repelled by the sweetness. Modern sweet corn is one of the few crops you can eat right off the vine, so to speak. It’s clean, tender, flavorful and palatable.
Hi Lance, thank you for the tip, although I think I would have been there all day if I were to eat them all fresh from the pick! 🙂 I thought best to freeze them because I had so many, plus my Dad’s growing them too so we are a little over run
The climbing beans aren’t necessarily a disaster - you can always dry them and then use them in soups & stews over the winter (usual method: soak overnight first, boil for 10 mins before simmering). I’m afraid it might be too late for those squashes though, unless we have a long, warm Autumn to ripen them up a bit…
That’s true, someone gave me the idea of growing my borlotti beans up there instead which I love! I always leave this to dry and use them throughout winter, they are delicious added to stews and curries etc.