Note: Planning your vegetable choices is important. It is a good idea to keep a special book for your records of what you planted, which section and the year etc, for future reference. You are welcome to copy and print out any of the information here to help you plan your Crop Rotation. You might also like to copy out the information on our  Companion Gardening & Raised Veggie Gardens pages.

Crop Rotation means that you rotate the crops around the veggie garden beds systematically. The rule of thumb for crop rotation is to rotate the plants each year "Counter-clockwise" or "Anti-clockwise", as the diagram below shows.

Different plants take different nutrients out of the ground soil and add back other elements or enhance the soil in other ways. To prevent your garden from becoming less productive from season to season, crops are Rotated. Hence the name "Crop Rotation".

Importantly, crop rotation allows you to naturally interrupt the life cycle of pests and diseases so they cannot become established.

Of course, this applies only to Annual plantings, not the perennial plants, such as asparagus.  And yes, like us - plants can wear each other out! Horticulturally, it’s because plants from the same family tend to have the same nutritional needs and can exhaust the soil of particular elements if continually planted in succession. They can also attract the same problems which can build up alarmingly unless the plant families are moved around. 

Below is just a Sample Outline of Crop Rotation:

So a typical sample 4 bed Rotation might look like this:

Bed 1: Root Crops, onions
Bed 2: Legumes (peas, beans), brassicas (broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, brussels sprouts)
Bed 3: Tomatoes, eggplant, capsicum (peppers)
Bed 4: Sweet corn, curcubits (cucumber, melons, pumpkin)

A 6 bed Rotation might look like this:

Bed 1: Legumes
Bed 2: Brassicas
Bed 3: Root crops, carrots, parsnips, potatoes
Bed 4: Corn, curcubits
Bed 5: Tomatoes, capsicums, eggplant
Bed 6: Green manure crop

Crop Rotation Info Chart

There is a Crop Rotation Chart below that may help you plan your vegetable garden. There are 8 groups:- Sweet Corn, Potatoes, Cabbage family, Peas, Tomatoes, Beans, Root crops, and Squash. Each of these groups have characteristics that use nutrients or build soil uniquely. In addition, you need to consider space for each vegetable rotation sequence.

The following plant list is based upon the space that they use:-

Small or Densely Planted: Onion, Beat, Chard, Parsley, Celery, Parsnip, Rutabaga, Kale, Radish, Brussels sprouts, Cucumber

Small Individual Plants: Lettuce, Pepper, Carrot, Summer Squash, Bean (Bush), Cabbage, Spinich

Medium-Sized Plants: Tomato, Cauliflower, Broccoli

Large Rows or Patches: Potato, Pea, Winter Squash, Climbing Beans

Large Separate Patches: Corn, Watermelon, Pumpkins etc

Sweet Corn: Sweet Corn is a heavy feeder. Two corn crops should not be grown side by side. Spread this crop as widely as possible in your rotation. Also, if you are using manure, the corn patch should be your primary location.

Potatoes: Potatoes have been shown to get their best yield when they follow corn. Did you know that? So put your potatoes in next year where your sweet corn is this year.

Peas: Peas are a legume and have the wonderful trait of pulling nitrogen from the air and depositing it in soil. For this reason it is the perfect crop to plant just in front of the corn. Peas are an excellent crop to rotate in front of any heavy feeder.

*Tomatoes and Peppers: Tomatoes and peppers should not be grown directly after potatoes. Tomatoes and Potatoes share the same diseases and pests, so if you can plant them in soil at least one year separated, you have a chance of allowing some of the diseases to be eliminated by some of the other natural chemicals of other plants.

  * See more about Tomatoes here. (This link will open in a separate window, so you can then just close that window and still stay on this page)       

Cabbage Family: The cabbage family are also heavy feeders. Planting a legume in front of the cabbage family works well. Beans would be a good choice.

Onions are interesting plants: They tend to be beneficial as a preceding crop as well as a companion crop. Planting onions in front of cabbage is also a good choice.

Squash is a good “cleaning” crop: Their vines can spread wide and thick to help control weeds. Also, tilling their large leaves into the ground provides excellent organic material.

Carrots and Beets are hard on soil: They are good candidates to follow Squash. The squash will help to control weeds for successive crops.

Plant like with like. Divide your plants into families because they need broadly similar conditions and they generally get along together. The odd exception is usually because of pests and disease challenges, such as Potatoes and tomatoes, whereby tomatoes attract potatoe blight. Tomatoes and Asparagus are ideal to plant together.  (Note) The link will open in a separate window. Just close that window when you ahe ahd a read, and you will still be on this page.

Out of thousands of plant families, here are a few of the most familiar ones:

Grasses (Gramineae), like cereals and corn.

Mustard Family (Cruciferae). Cold loving plants, such as Brassicas like cabbage, kale, bok choy, collards like kohl rabi and turnip, etc. Also radish and cress.

Pea Family (Leguminosae). These include peas, of course, and beans plus vetch, lentils and lupins.

Carrot Family (Umbelliferae). Lots of long root crops here, like carrots, parsnips, parsley, celeriac, fennel, chervil, and the root herbs.

Goosefoot Family (Chenopodiaceae). A mixture here, such as beets, swiss chard and spinach.

Nightshade Family (Solanaceae). The well know potato and tomato plants. Also eggplant, chillies and peppers. Exception: It is not wise to plant Potatoes and Tomatoes together, as  tomatoes attract potato blight.

Gourd Family (Cucurbitaceae). Warm loving plants such as melons, pumpkins, squashes and other gourds.

Composite Family (Compositae). So called because of their complex composite flowers, they include endive, witlof, sunlfower, Jerusalem and globe artichoke, salsify and some herbs like dandelion, yarrow and chamomile.

Just a few of the many other plant families include:-

Buckwheat Family (Polygonaceae) which has rhubarb;

Morning Glory Family (Convolvulaceae) which supplies us with yams, kumara and sweet potatoes;

Mallow Family (Malvaceae) supplying okra;

Rose Family (Rosaceae) with most fruits and berries including strawberries:

Mint Family (Labiatae) which include mint, sage, oregano, marjoram, thyme, rosemary, basil, lemon balm, savory, bergamot and many other herbs.

Below is a simple drawing for you to easily see what vegies go where!

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