How many people make compost but use only half of it and walk on the other half? Before you say “not me,” give it a little thought. Just how much of your garden is paths, and how much is vegetables? How much work did you do spading and tilling to improve soil structure and humus content, and then how much of it actually benefitted your plants?
Those are the kinds of questions a growing number of gardeners are asking to win converts to a new type of gardening, usually known as the biodynamic–French intensive method. Intensive gardening first caught on in California, and although still centered there it’s quickly spreading across the country.
Basically the idea behind intensive gardening is to get maximum production with minimum inputs. All soil conditioners are used in planting beds, not on areas that will be used for paths, thus enabling your plants to benefit directly from all the material you put on your garden.
The method relies on raised or rounded planting beds 3 to 5 feet wide. These beds are prepared by working the soil to a depth of about 2 feet and adding generous amounts of compost and manure. The mounded beds produce a soil that warms quickly, drains well, and takes in air easily. With beds you never walk on, or carry equipment across, soil compaction is no problem. Plants are spaced as close as possible in triangular patterns covering an entire bed.
The intensive system as it is known today had its beginning as a student garden project at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Alan Chadwick, a British horticulturist, devised and taught the method to students on the project. Chadwick combined what he felt were the best points of French market gardening, stressing maximum production; biodynamic gardening, with its emphasis on soil structure and fertility; and British horticulture, which brings a strong sense of exactness to gardening.
When planning an intensive garden, remember that plants do not grow in rows in nature, and should not in your garden. Row planting is an invention of man to make it easier to cultivate large areas at one time. Your seeds should be planted in diagonally offset patterns, forming a hexagon with all seeds spaced evenly to get maximum production. A newly planted area should look something like a honeycomb.
The intensive gardens in California all make extensive use of flowers. Not only are flowers pleasing to the eye; they attract bees for improved pollination and many predatory insects. This, combined with improved soil structure and a healthy soil life in a well-prepared raised bed, will give you healthy plants that resist insect attack.
Plant Spacing in Inches for Intensive Planting
| Beans, bush — 4 | Carrots — 2 | Lettuce, leaf — 8 | Radishes — 1 |
| Beans, pole — 8 | Cauliflower — 15 | Mustard greens — 4 | Rhubarb — 24 |
| Beets — 3 | Corn — 12 | Onions — 3 | Spinach — 4 |
| Broccoli — 12 | Eggplant — 18 | Peas, bush — 3 | Squash, bush — 18 |
| Brussels sprouts — 16 | Kale — 15 | Peas, pole — 6 | Tomatoes, staked — 18 |
| Cabbage — 12 | Lettuce, head — 10 | Peppers — 12 | Turnips — 4 |
Originally published in magazine, February 1976
Republished in magazine's Special Collector's Issue, February/March 2015
Illustration by Christopher Peterson