Companion Plants for Corn
The Three Sisters are made up of corn, winter squash, and mature dry beans, not summer squash or green beans. Summer squash has a short shelf life and hardly any nutrition or calories while winter squash, with its thick outer rind, can be stored for months. Dried beans, unlike green, store for long periods of time and are packed with protein. The combination of these three created a subsistence diet that would have been augmented with fish and game. Not only did this trio store well and provided calories, protein, and vitamins, but planting squash and beans next to corn had qualities that benefited each. The beans set nitrogen into the soil to be used by successive crops, the corn provided a natural trellis for the beans to clamber up, and the large squash leaves shaded the soil to cool it and retain moisture.
Additional Corn Plant Companions
Other companion plants for corn include:
Cucumbers Lettuce Melons Peas Potatoes Sunflowers
Note: Not every plant works when companion gardening. Tomatoes, for instance, are a no-no for planting next to corn. This is just a sampling of plants to grow with corn. Do your homework prior to planting corn in the garden to see which ones work well together and are also suited to your growing region.
