Love this. The three sisters system came from Mexico as do all three plants. My indiginous mexican grandparents used it as well as my Lakota grandparents. It's my second year and I'm in a different state so it'll be trial and error. I really liked this video. So thank you 💟
@jessicamd8232 Yes, the three sisters moved north, and were adopted thousands of years later. But the northern tribes do use sweet corn, and the original corn to use are harder flint corns. To make masa and most Mexican cuisine. The three sisters are a drying system. The beans should be dry and rattling on the dry flint corn just in time for a fall harvest with the ripened squash. This is mostly why the system is so much harder for the northern tribes because the sweet corn is ready way earlier than the beans and corn is used as the bean pole. Plus, harvesting sweet corn way earlier than the squash is ready. It is like walking through a jungle, trying not to step on baby squashes. Sweet corn truly isn't meant to be grown in the three sisters because the timelines do not fall into place, sadly. 🤍
I would love to see future videos of your harvest and preservation methods! I want to keep learning and practicing indigenous gardening ways because I think it will help us heal ourselves and life around us from the sicknesses of our time. Thank you for this video and future ones!
Loved this!! The interesting information along with simple directions makes the gardening techniques easy to understand and remember. I'm excited to try the three sisters system along with the forth, my sunflowers! The whole philosophy of seven generations makes me realize why I have such respect for indigenous people as they pass their knowledge on to those smart enough to listen. Thank you!
Thank you for this video. I started my vegetable garden in 2020 and my first year I called my garden my experimental garden. I now have 8 raised gardens and fruit trees. I'm blessed to live in SW Florida to be able to grow year-round. I did my banana trees in a permaculture circle. I will try the 3 sisters garden.
As a Native American myself this video made so much sense. I got to your channel by watching gardening videos sooo a gardening channel would be awesome ❤❤ I also enjoyed the Native American story telling ❤
Thanks for explaining and demonstrating this amazing yet simple gardening practice. I'll definitely be trying it in my own garden. I'm trying to become more mindful about consumption and using what's currently around me so this was a great video! Thank you for also crediting where the practice originated from ❤
I'm looking forward to trying this next year here in the UK. I also have tons of self seeded sunflowers that appear each year all around my disorganised allotment ❤ Thanks for a lovely video and your thoughts on permaculture. I find that I am trying to learn what plants will work on my plot at the moment as it adjusts to not being dug. I have found that broadcasting turnips and moolis and chick peas is also a fab way to cover ground. I eat some and let the rest turn into soil.
As you stated, the 3 sisters were accompanied by sunflowers. The Mesoamericans also planted chilis 🌶️ to make it the 5th sister as these were essential foods. Albeit not near the squash’s as the leaves would smother the chili plants. Course, chilis in Mexico are perennial so they would have been placed around the edges of the milpa. I’m experimenting with these four plants for the first time in a limited space and I will say the leaves and vines of the squash plants have taken over. I planted the corn first so they are taller and doing fine. Can’t find the chili plants and can’t get to the beans either 😅. I was too ambitious! 😆 I know better for next year 😄
I was planning on planting Jerusalem artichokes this year along with the three sisters and did not know this about sunflowers. Seeing as the sun choke is a sunflower I hope it works in the same way!
Thank you for the video. I love history and learning how and why the ancestors did things. To me, growing and eating like they did can be an excellent way to connect with our ancestors. I come from a farming background, where we grew both organic and non organic produce. I now farm/garden for myself and my family, and am exploring other options apart from just row cropping. Exploring the 3 sisters, it seems many people are very excited at first, but perhaps a bit let down by harvest time. It seems yields may be lower with this method than with other more modern methods, but as you pointed out, we aren't just concerned with our yield, but the yield in 7 generations. Of course, if we are actually living off our garden, we must be most concerned with feeding the next generation, or we'll never get the 7th. I have not tried the 3 sister method yet, but I know just the varieties I want to try next year. Succotash beans, Bloody Butcher corn, and Amish Pie pumpkins are heirlooms that have done great for me in the past. Thanks for the thought provoking, and good luck in your garden next season.
May I offer two suggestions? 1. Yes, your squash are wayyy too thick. One squash hill would take up all of your raised bed. I suggest that you prepare the ground around the bed for 5’ to 10’ out to become “squashetory”. 2. Jerusalem artichokes are a good tie in to your ideas. They are not an artichoke; they grow up like a slender sunflower. The roots develop bulb-like thingey-doos similar to potatoes. These plants like poor soil and full sun. They would do well in a location removed from your raised beds; some orphan corner of your lawn? Suggestion 2.1 is to grow some herbs, say, sweet basil and sage, as border plants along edges of your flower beds. My “garden” is a patch of peppermint about 4’ X 4’. Dried down, it makes wonderful tea, and maybe a mint julep.😏 Courtesy of Half Vast Flying I congratulate your experiments. Experimenting is fun, develops us toward self improvement efforts, and are knowledge bases to expand us. Good on ya!!
Hi, I'm ELiH from the Philippines, I'm training Specialist of Agricultural Training Institute in our region at the same time as the Organic Agriculture Program Point Person. I'm so amazed with your effort and passion. Keep it up 💋
This is SUCH a good video. Thank you for sharing. I hope you are well. This is kinder & gentler than ice age farmer, who is very informative. God bless you.
Omg I loved this SO MUCH. Very important conversation here about permaculture! I’ve been struggling trying to find BIPOC-led spaces to learn about permaculture. I can’t wait to see how your crops turn out! 😊
omg thank you 😭 i highly recommend checking out leah penniman from soul fire farm - i first found out about her from her interview on adrienne maree brown's podcast and now her book farming while black is on my to-read list! thanks again for watching and leaving such a sweet comment, i really appreciate it ❤️
I’m late but I learned so much from this video! I already had an idea of the three sisters but from permaculture ethics to the interpretation you gave with context and background from an indigenous peoples was eye opening and made my passion to learn and do more grow. Subscribed! Thanks a lot! 💛
I love the lemon tree behind you . I wish i had one of those. I am a second year gardener s as well. I’m glad i found your page. I’m going to do the 3 sisters this year too.
"El mundo es ancho y ajeno" is a classic indigenista novel published in 1941 by the peruvian writer Ciro Alegría. I mention it because in its first page there's a scene of the harvest of the communal cornfields, showing the milpa or three sisters system: corn-beans-squash
