Succession sowing: a short row every few weeks beats one big one

Succession sowing means sowing a short row every few weeks instead of one long row at once. One big sowing of lettuce gives you thirty heads in the same week, most of which bolt before you can eat them. Six lettuces every three weeks gives you salad all summer.

It’s the simplest way to make a small vegetable garden produce more, and to waste less.

How it works

Fast crops are ready all at once and don’t last long once they’re ready. Radishes go woody, lettuces bolt, peas get starchy. Spacing out the sowings spreads out the harvest.

A simple rule: sow the next batch when the previous one has come up and has its first true leaves. That keeps a new batch always coming along.

Crops that suit it, and how often

Crop	Sow every	Notes
Radishes	2 weeks	Ready in about a month. Sow in shade in midsummer.
Lettuce	2 to 3 weeks	Loose-leaf types in summer bolt less.
Salad leaves	3 to 4 weeks	Each sowing gives several cuts.
Rocket	3 weeks	Best in spring and late summer, as it bolts in heat.
Spring onions	3 to 4 weeks	A short row each time.
Carrots	3 to 4 weeks	Stop about three months before the first autumn frost.
Beetroot	4 weeks	Stop about twelve weeks before the first autumn frost.
Peas	3 to 4 weeks	Stop sowing in early summer, when heat slows them.
Dwarf beans	3 to 4 weeks	From two weeks after the last frost to about twelve weeks before the first.
Spinach	3 weeks	Spring and late summer. Bolts in long, hot days.

Planning it

1. Decide how much you’ll actually eat in two or three weeks. That’s the size of each sowing.
2. Work out your window: the first and last sowing dates for each crop where you live. Your crop calendar or seed packet gives you these, usually counted from your last spring frost and first autumn frost.
3. Mark sowing days in a diary or app, or set a reminder for every other weekend.
4. Leave space for each new batch, or sow where an earlier crop has just come out.

Starting batches in modules or small pots indoors helps too. While one batch grows in the bed, the next is growing in a tray, ready to go in when space frees up.

Swapping crops through the year

Succession sowing doesn’t have to be the same crop. As one crop finishes, follow it with another:

• Early peas, then dwarf beans or leeks.
• Early potatoes, then late carrots or winter salads.
• Spring lettuce, then autumn spinach or oriental leaves.

This keeps beds full and is the idea behind square foot gardening, where each square is replanted as soon as it’s harvested.

Common mistakes

Sowing too much each time. The commonest. Small and often is the point.

Forgetting a batch. Set reminders. Missing one sowing means a gap a month later.

Sowing the wrong crop for the season. Rocket, spinach and peas bolt or stall in hot weather. Switch to lettuce and beans in midsummer, and back again in late summer.

For salad crops in particular, see cut-and-come-again salad and sowing carrots every three weeks.