I love to sow seeds by broadsowing. I don’t have to make lines in my beds and the plants fill in every space in my bed, leaving less room for weeds.
I’m planing on growing some beds this year where I mix 2-3 species in groups and broadcast them. I’m looking for inspiration on which ones to prioritize and want to hear what you have good or less good experience with.
What are your favorite species to broadcast?
Grains and wildflowers.
Parsnip,and salsify for deeproots and plugs, Camomille for it’s not taking up room, light foliage not shading and they say it’s a doctors plant, Phacelia for attracting pollinators and it’s easy to remove. Lettuces like four season, winter and rucola i like to broadcast, also functioning as a distractor for snail sensitive crops.
In winter lambsquarter and claytonia for easy removable groundcover which will take up important space in spring when weeds want to take off to the moon, I suspect some seed germination blocker in claytonia, So that’s in dedicated areas and not broadcasting at all. But now i typed it so let it be said.
Timely topic Rod, the cattle farmer i do the project with has watched Sepp Holzer’s Farming with nature documentary and decided he wants to try Sepp’s 50 species broadcasting mix of which i have no idea what’s in it.
Great question! I have also been wondering about this as I make beds and sow them.
The best answers come from experimentations and direct observations for our own areas. Ive decided to mix it up into 4 beds for now. These beds are about 2 m wide and 4-5 m long. Nothing fancy. Just loose soil mixed with grass roots and other weeds, and raked up into mounds.
Here are a few images:
This one shows the first few that I planted Yacon into, as well as nasturtium, red peppers, and bulbing onions. Other beds included sun chokes and helianthus instead of yacon.
I made some micro-swales/terrraces on them and started broadcasting some seeds into the rows, and other seeds all over the bed, depending on the species.
The 4 beds that were planted in a borderline “chaos garden” fashion mostly include:
Carrots
Nasturtium
Hugos Eggplant Grex
Marcelas White Daisy
Tagetes Erectica
Radish var. Oleiformis
Mustard Greens (everyone together mix)
Hugos Chamomile Grex
Echinaciea Grex
Hugos Dill Grex
Turnip (all together mix)
Hugos Red/White Beets
Swiss Chard (all together mix)
Celery (all together mix)
Taiwan Spinach
Leaf Chicory
Taiwan Okra
Some of these beds received other seeds as well.
Everything was planted right before we received a few days of rain. A lot of things are starting to sprout, but the slugs and snails are in the thousands, and im not doing anything about them. I also don’t intend to water unless there is a very long period without rain, and i don’t intend to fertilize.
Now it is a waiting game to see what can handle the neglect. Strategic neglect…
My edible flower bed with species from mostly Asteraceae gave me lots of seed last year. I could probably broadsow many of those. I’m curious, what are some wild flowers where you are? Where I am they would probably be looked upon as exotic.
parsley, coriander/cilantro, dill, chamomile, calendula, swiss chard/perpetual spinach, chicory, raddichio, lettuce, rocket, radish, parsnips.
Every season I add seeds and see what is happy growing like that.
