 Good morning. I'm David Kuhn. I'm a regional extension agent with the Alabama Quarter of Extension System and as part of our Grow More Give More series we're going to talk a little bit about crop rotation today. What is crop rotation? Well, it's one of the oldest agricultural practices that we have and it involves changing the planting locations of different crops throughout each growing season. And we do this to reduce damage from insect pests, limit the development of vegetable diseases and also manage soil fertility. So why is it important? Each vegetable can be classified into a particular plant family. Plants belong to the same family, often are susceptible to the same insect pests and diseases and have similar nutrient requirements. When vegetables classified in the same plant family are grown year after year in the same area of a garden they provide insect pests with a reliable food source and disease organisms, pathogens with a continual source of host plants that they can infect. Over time, insect pests and pathogen numbers build in an area and damage to vegetable crops increases. Using crop rotation helps keep insect pests and pathogen numbers at low levels. In addition, the type of vegetable grown in a particular area in a garden has a direct effect on the fertility of the soil in that area. Each vegetable is unique in the type and amount and nutrients it extracts from the soil so crop rotation can even out the loss of different soil nutrients and allow time for nutrients to replenish. So when we talk about plant families we divide those families down to four major areas is when we're talking about garden vegetables. Crucifers or cool season leafy crops include cabbage, collards, kale, mustard, broccoli, and turnips. Our solinaceous crops, nightshades, include tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, and eggplants. Cucumbers include cucumbers, cantaloupes, squash, watermelons, and pumpkins. And our last category is grasses and did you know that corn was actually classified as a grass? When we talk about rotation in a garden we're simply saying we're going to change the locations of rows every year for each plant family. For plant families where you only grow a half of a row or a quarter of a row of a particular type of plant you can simply change the end of the row that you start those plants on. You need to plan for a four-year rotation meaning where you planted your solinaceous crops this year will not be planted with that same plant family for the following three years. If size permits plan for a fifth year where you allow a portion of your garden to lay fallow for that planting season and then add it back to the rotation. When we look at raised beds we're going to treat each bed as an individual row. Plant different plant families in each bed each year. If you only have one or two raised beds try to divide the beds in half and plant different plant families in each half of a bed each year. If you need more space you can also supplement your raised beds with an in-ground garden space if possible. And when we look at growing in containers we want to treat those containers the same as raised beds. Rotate crop families between containers each planting season. If you only have one container replace the soil in that container each planting season and sanitize the container before refilling. Thank you for joining us today to learn a little about crop rotation. If you have any other questions feel free to call the master gardener helpline at 1-877-252-4769. Thank you for joining us today.