Crop rotation planning manual

Johnson, eds. Volk, J. Jeavons, J. Willits, Calif. Kroeck, S. Stevenson, Conn. Let's Stay Connected. By entering your email, you consent to receive communications from Penn State Extension. View our privacy policy. Thank you for your submission! Start Farming: Planning a Crop Rotation.

Write down your goals. Describe what are you trying to achieve with your rotation. See Table 1 for a list of common goals identified by experienced farmers.

Prioritize your goals. Which goals are most important for your farm? List crops you plan to grow and how much you plan to grow. Create rotational groups. Group crops by family, planting arrangement, nutrient needs, timing, or other important qualities. See Tables 2 and 3. Check for excessive acreage of one crop family. Make a map of your farm or garden. Make sure the map is drawn to scale. It helps to download a real map of your farm with soil types from a web soil survey that you can overlay field drawings onto see the NRCS Web Soil Survey.

They have a function where you can measure field sizes on their map. Divide your farm or garden into equal-size rotational units. It is much easier to plan your rotation in terms of fields of the same size or uniform strips within fields.

For example, divide the farm into 2-acre fields or into beds feet long by 5 feet wide. The size of the units will depend on the size of your farm and what you can "get your head around. Define the land area rotational units needed for each grouping of crops. For example, you may devote several units to a certain crop, like pumpkins, and only one unit to other crops, like carrots.

Identify conditions on your farm that will affect which crops are grown where on the farm. Few farms or even gardens have uniform conditions in each part of the farm. Some fields may be wet. Some fields may dry out and warm up earlier in the spring, making them good fields for early planting. Some fields may have problems with diseases or pests. Note these conditions on your farm map. Make multiple copies of your farm map. Using copies of the farm map, compare possible rotations.

For detailed worktables, see Mohler and Johnson, eds. See Table 4 for "field table with a time axis" blank forms. Table 1. Common goals for crop rotation. Table 2. Download Crop Rotation on Organic Farms for free at www. Please specify title requested when ordering by mail. Discounts are available on orders of 10 or more. Allow weeks for delivery. Please, insert a valid email. Thank you, your email will be added to the mailing list once you click on the link in the confirmation email.

Spam protection has stopped this request. Please contact site owner for help. This Site Cornell. Home About. Cornell Horticulture News and views from the Department of Horticulture. Other features include: Problems and opportunities for more than crop sequences Characteristics of more than 60 crops and 70 weeds Crop diseases hosted by more than 80 weed species Modes of transmission for diseases found in 24 crops Thirteen sample four- and five-year vegetable and grain crop rotations Step-by-step procedure for determining crop rotation plans Download Crop Rotation on Organic Farms for free at www.