A little while ago there was an off-topic discussion about tomatoes and broccoli growing together, and how the synergy of cold tolerant with non cold tolerant MAY in some fashion increase the cold tolerance of the tomato.
So I want to propose a test. Plant tomatoes (just to keep things standardized) in one test set. Plant tomatoes with brassicas at the same time in another test set. Plant brassicas a week or two before the tomatoes in the third group, and plant brassicas alone in the fourth group.
Put them somewhere 65 degrees or cooler, where they will all get the same light.
This would have to be done by someone with a grow room or equivalent, and a lot of brassica seeds. I don’t fit either criteria. I may try it in a different form, but because of space constraints I couldn’t do a true test.
I think that’s a wonderful idea. My “grow room” (a.k.a. my desk) is currently filled with banana seeds, so I couldn’t do the experiment exactly as outlined, but I could try something modified outside:
Tomato seeds winter sown under a milk jug far away from any brassica seeds.
Tomato seeds winter sown under a milk jug about two feet away from brassica seeds.
Tomato seeds winter sown under a milk right next to brassica seeds.
And I can see if it makes any noticeable difference by spring.
Of course, to make it fair, I’d probably need to use the same tomato and brassica varieties. Using a genetically variable landrace for either might skew the results.
I’m thinking Roma tomatoes and De Cicco broccoli, since I have seed packets of both of them, and they’re very well known varieties.
. . . I’m tempted to buy more Musa acuminata banana seeds and test them out the same way, since that’s a companion crop pairing I’m thinking I want to try anyway.
It would be great if winter sowing worked well for everything. It would make things so much easier to be doing the sowing gradually, a bit at a time, over the course of months, rather than scrambling to try to do everything in one week.