Quick tips for continuous crops of fresh veggies

Lettuce.

Vegetable gardening is a continuous process. Soil can get exhausted and could develop a build-up of disease-causing pathogens. It's important to have a system for growing veges and group plants (vege & flowers) based on their characteristics.

. If you have multiple garden beds, an effective tip is to divide crops into respective planting areas. Plan beds in anticipation of the change in crops. Some gardeners have 4 beds (one for each vege family).

· Alliaceae (Chives, Onions)

· Cruciferae (Brassicas)

· Cucurbitaceae (Cucumber, pumpkin, squash)

· Legumes (peas, beans)

Cooler season veges are: brassicas (broccoli, cauliflower, broccolinis, spinach, endive, radicchio)

Warmer season veges are: beans, eggplants, tomatoes

All season options: lettuces, carrots, onions, herbs

If you have a smaller space, consider the following ideas for crop rotation: Instead of making 1 large, raised garden bed, consider having 3-4 smaller ones or consider using larger pots for plants that are more prone to diseases.

When plants get diseases, the disease-causing elements (bacterial, fungal, viral diseases etc) stay in the soil for a while where the infected plants used to be.

If your area isn't big enough for rotation planting, don't plant anything in the garden for a year or two so disease-causing soil elements have nothing to feed on. Consider planting in containers temporarily to ensure vege supply.

Peanuts are great in fixing nitrogen into the soil which improves soil fertility. They are usually followed by brassicas which are nitrogen-hungry.

Peas are good to plant before squash. Beans enrich the soil and are a good crop to plant after tomatoes.

When the same veges are planted in the same spot year after year, the soil may no longer have the nutrients required by the plants.