Field vegetable rotations are a cornerstone of agroecological, regenerative and organic horticultural systems. Well-designed crop rotations help build soil health, manage pests, diseases and weeds, and support resilient, productive vegetable cropping on farms and market gardens.
This Hub builds on Agricology’s Rotations for Field Vegetables Technical Guide and accompanying video, providing a practical introduction to the principles and practice of rotation planning, and exploring how crop rotations support more sustainable approaches to farming and food production.
The Rotations Hub brings together a wide range of resources on crop rotation for horticultural systems, including videos, design tools, blogs, research papers and real-world case studies. Drawing on the Agricology archive and wider practitioner knowledge, it offers opportunities to learn from other growers, explore different approaches to planning vegetable rotations, and pick up practical, field-tested tips.
Take your time to explore the resources, follow your interests, and deepen your understanding.
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Introduction to rotations
Rotations entail keeping closely related crops together and growing them sequentially on one plot of land over different years. Rotations have been around as long as agriculture itself and are fundamental to ensure that diversity is designed into the farming system in time and space.
Organic crop rotations
This Soil Association PDF provides an overview of what you may need to take into consideration when planning rotations for field crops.
Use of diverse rotations
This abstract explores how the organic practice of using diverse rotations to reduce pest and disease levels in following crops can be applied on non-organic farms.
Do we need rotations?
Rotations remain the principal tool in the organic and regenerative grower’s box for managing soil fertility, weeds, pests and diseases. However Natural Agriculture systems are challenging this paradigm.
Shumei Natural Agriculture
The concept of Shumei Natural Agriculture was developed by the Japanese naturalist and philosopher Mokichi Okada in the 1930s in Japan who said: “The principle of Natural Agriculture is an overriding respect and concern for nature.” The most challenging aspect of Shumei Natural Agriculture is the absence of rotations, with continuous cropping to allow crops to become accustomed to the soil they grow in and wider environment with plants building up resistance to pests and diseases.
Fundamentals of rotation design
The following sections signpost further resources on the major elements that need to be considered when designing a vegetable rotation.
Whole Farm Systems Approach
The field rotation is the only part of the farm system that can’t be considered in isolation. There may be protected cropping, perennials, fruit orchards, irrigation ponds, pasture for livestock… Fields may vary across the farm. Many other factors can act as challenges or constraints on the rotation.
Climate Resilience: a Guide for Growers
This guide from OGA and CSA Network aims to provide practical knowledge to improve growers’ resilience and flexibility in the face of increasing climate-based challenges.
Fundamentals of rotation design
Inclusion of legumes
The use of legumes which can fix nitrogen biologically is a crucial element of rotations, in order to replace nitrogen extracted from the soil by crops.
Full of Beans! Integrating dried beans into your crop rotation
Recording of a 2024 Organic Growers Gathering session that explored the potential and challenges of integrating dried beans into horticultural crop rotations.
Fundamentals of rotation design
Balancing fertility-building, nutrient applications and exploitative cropping
The fertility-building period is crucial to the whole rotation and grass-clover leys and cover crops should be considered as important crops and managed accordingly. It is also a good time to apply phosphorus and potassium through manures and composts, and, when needed, lime. The resources below will help you plan the nutrients you may need and managing for optimum soil health and healthy crops.
Fundamentals of rotation design
Weed competition
Rotations and market gardens can fail due to weed burdens, so it is vital to use the tools and knowledge available to ensure weeds, particularly perennial weeds, are kept in balance.
Crop rotation and its ability to suppress perennial weeds
Guidance from the OK-Net Arable project to help you manage perennial weeds effectively through crop rotations.
Creeping Thistle Technical Guide
An essential guide for organic farmers outlining ways to prevent creeping thistle from taking hold and the most effective control measures.
Common Couch Management in Organic Systems
Leaflet summarising organic methods of prevention and weed control of the perennial grass common couch.
Allelopathy – a practical weed management tool?
A leaflet looking at the possibility of using allelopathy in weed management.
Bucking the trend: an alternative approach to couch control
Phil Sumption asks how can we manage pernicious perennial weeds without using chemicals or cultivations that can damage the soil?
Buckwheat for couch control. Final report
This report details the findings of an Innovative Farmers field lab which examined the potential for buckwheat to reduce couch grass infestations in horticultural rotations.
Fundamentals of rotation design
Pests and diseases
Crops within the same family groups are subject to the same pests and diseases. Allowing time to pass before similar crops return to the same piece of land breaks the reproductive cycle of pests and soil-borne diseases. Also sequences of crops can be important in keeping pest and disease at bay.
Wireworm and Integrated Pest Management (IPM)
Innovative farmers webinar with conclusions and recommendations from the field lab on using cover and biofumigant crops to reduce wireworm populations in potatoes.
Organic Potatoes: Cultivating quality – step by step
This booklet on organic potato production adapted from the original German version contains a discussion on the position of potatoes in the rotation.
Leatherjacket control
A useful note produced as part of an Innovative Farmers field lab, which focuses on the lifecycle of leatherjackets and outlines some of the management and biological control options.
Fertility-building leys
This section looks at the guidance on the options available for building long-term fertility within vegetable rotations
Fertility building leys
Guidance on legume species characteristics and management to help you formulate your own seed mixtures, based on Legume LINK research.
Including diverse leys in arable rotations
Practice abstract created as part of the DiverIMPACTS project outlining some of the many advantages to more complex mixtures of leguminous leys and some of the challenges and key practical considerations.
Grass clover ley species and variety selection and management
This review from IOTA provides a wealth of information on grass and legume species and varieties, mixture selection, ley establishment and pasture management.
Cover crops and green manures
The terms cover crops and green manures tend to be used interchangeably, as crops grown for the benefit of the soil; to retain nutrients (reduce leaching), boost nitrogen through fixation, and feed the soil through adding organic matter. They tend to be short-term in use, filling gaps in rotations, whereas fertility-building leys are in for longer periods.
Nutrient budgeting and monitoring your rotation
Nutrient budgets are useful tools to help farmers and growers make the right nutrient management decisions. Soil analysis can also aid understanding of how a rotation is performing. However yield monitoring, crop health observations and gut instinct are also vital.
A Guide to Nutrient Budgeting on Organic Farms
Everything you may need to know about basic nutrient budgeting and valuable insights into how using them can benefit your farm.
The Nutrient Management Plans section of Nutrient Management Guide
A good nutrient management plan provides a foundation for in-season management and can highlight ways to improve your approach. Use this guide to create your own plan.
ROTOR: organic crop rotation planner
A tool from Leibniz Centre for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF)in Germany to help you plan for food and fodder within your rotation and consider weed management, plant health, maximising nitrogen (N) fixation and avoiding N losses.
Soil Analysis and Management
Improving and managing soil fertility in organic farming systems though soil analysis; what you need to know and how you can do it.
Case studies
Theory of rotation is one thing, practice is another, which is why real life rotations and understanding how they have developed and evolved is vital.
Further reading
The following items are not available for free on the internet, but may be useful if you want to venture further into some of the topics connected to vegetable rotations.
The Organic Growers Alliance
The Organic Growers Alliance is a membership organisation (CIC) representing organic growers in the UK and Ireland. It publishes the Quarterly Journal The Organic Grower and has built up a huge body of technical articles written by growers, advisers and researchers since 2007, Back issues, with index are available to members. Relevant articles include:
Dowding C (2010) Compost or Green Manures? The Organic Grower (OGA, No.13, Winter 2010)
Hitchings R (2009) Crop Planning – Nightmare or Salvation? The Organic Grower (OGA, No.8, Spring 2009, p.14)
Rayns F (2019) Comfrey- participatory Research and Fertility Building. The Organic Grower (OGA, No.49., Autumn 2019, p.26)
Tolhurst I (2008) Relay Green Manures. The Organic Grower (OGA, No.5, Summer 2008. p.21)
Tolhurst I (2020) Soil Obesity – is your Soil Putting on Weight? The Organic Grower (OGA, No.53 Winter 2020, p.13)
Westaway S (2020) Can you Control Couch with Buckwheat? The Organic Grower (OGA, No.52, Autumn 2020, p.30)
With thanks to Matt Smee, Andy Dibben and David Newman for some of the images used within the Hub. The majority of other images are drawn from the Agricology website where they are credited in corresponding content.
All Rights Reserved apply to all images
Edited by:
Janie CaldbeckAssociated Agricology Partner Organisation(s):
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