Proper Plant Spacing and Why it Matters (2024)

  • March 28, 2022

By Kim Toscano

Give new plants the best possible start through careful placement in the garden.

When spring fever strikes it’s easy to come home from the garden center with a carload of new plants. Whether you are planting a flower garden, shrub bed, or vegetables, proper plant spacing is your first step to a healthier garden. It is easy to overcrowd plants when they are young, but plants need a bit of elbow room to gather sunlight, spread their roots, and simply look their best. These tips will help you achieve proper plant spacing in the garden and understand why it matters.

Why Plant Spacing Matters

One reason to consider plant spacing is curb appeal. We’ve all seen misshapen trees or shrubs swallowing the corner of a house after having been planted too close. Proper plant spacing helps us to avoid a tangled mess of branches in the garden. By giving plants enough room to grow into maturity, we ensure they remain visually pleasing long into the future.

Aesthetics aside, plant spacing is critical to ensuring long-term plant health. When plants are crowded together, they compete for water, nutrients, and sunlight. Crowded plants often bloom poorly due to poor nutrition, or because not enough light reaches the shaded branches. In a vegetable garden, this results in lower yields. By spacing plants to accommodate the expected mature size of a plant, you ensure plants have enough room to develop a healthy root system and limit competition for access to water and nutrients. As a result, plants are less stressed and more resistant to pest problems.

Proper plant spacing also allows for adequate air circulation around plants, which helps fight plant diseases. Many disease agents require a moist or humid environment to develop. In crowded plantings, reduced airflow prevents moisture from evaporating from leaf surfaces, increasing the likelihood of foliar diseases. Good air circulation through proper plant spacing helps reduce fungal diseases in the garden.

The Basics of Plant Spacing

Before you begin planting, consider the amount of space the plant will require when it is full grown. This information is found on plant tags and in catalogues. When starting with small, young plants, it is easy to set them too close together. Resist the urge to fill every gap in the garden. Remember, plants grow!

Using the information from plant labels, think of the mature size as the circle of space the plant needs to grow. A hydrangea that matures to 5 feet wide needs a circle with a 5-foot diameter. When setting out three of these hydrangeas together in a grouping, you will want to set them 5 feet apart, measuring from the center of each plant. While we commonly plant vegetables in rows, you can use the same circle-based method to save space in the vegetable garden.

When planting two plants together that mature to different sizes, consider the needs of both plants. The easy way to determine spacing between different plants is to use the average of their mature sizes. As an example, when planting a 5-foot-wide hydrangea planted next to a boxwood that grows up to 3 feet wide, space the plants 4 feet apart. Remember to measure from the center of one plant to the next.

It is a good idea to set out all the plants before digging holes. A yard stick or small tape measure are handy tools to ensure proper plant spacing. And don’t worry if the garden looks sparse at first. Young shrubs will fill out the garden in two to three years, and perennials much quicker. You can always plant annuals in open spaces until shrubs put on some size.

Summary

Proper Plant Spacing and Why it Matters (1)

Article Name

Proper Plant Spacing and Why it Matters

Description

When spring fever strikes it’s easy to come home from the garden center with a carload of new plants. Whether you are planting a flower garden, shrub bed, or vegetables, proper plant spacing is your first step to a healthier garden.

Author

Kim Toscano

Publisher Name

WORX

Publisher Logo

Proper Plant Spacing and Why it Matters (2)

Related posts:

Aerocart Makes “Best Gifts For Gardners” List!How To Start A Garden

Category : How To, , Organizing, Project Ideas

Tags : flowers, Foliage, garden, lawn, Lawn and Garden, Plant Spacing, Spring, trees, worx

Proper Plant Spacing and Why it Matters (2024)

FAQs

Proper Plant Spacing and Why it Matters? ›

In addition to the increased possibility of disease, competition for space and for nutrients can reduce yields. Crowded root crops like carrots, beets, and radishes don't have enough space to fill out, resulting in stunted and irregular produce. The same goes for leafy crops like lettuce or kale.

Why do plants need proper spacing? ›

The correct plant spacing prevents overcrowding. This can lead to competition for resources such as water, nutrients, and sunlight. Spacing plants allows them to spread their roots and access the necessary nutrients in the soil.

Why is space important for plants? ›

The leaves need space so they sunlight can get to them. The roots need room to spread out to absorb water and nutrients. How much space do the plants in your Sit Spot have? Measure the distance from where one plant comes out of the ground to where the next plant comes out of the ground.

Why is spacing important? ›

Spacing aids in breaking down information into smaller, more manageable "chunks," which aligns with the concept of working memory in cognitive psychology. Better chunking makes information easier to process and recall.

How much does plant spacing matter? ›

Spacing in the Garden

If you plant them too closely together, their roots will compete with each other for sunlight, water, and nutrients, and you may well end up with mature plants that are smaller and less productive than they would've been if you'd given them enough room to grow.

How does spacing affect plant growth? ›

Significantly wider spacing produced higher size of plant height, leaf length and number of leaves. Bulb length, diameter and weight also the same trend in wider spacing.

What is the ideal distance between two plants? ›

Row spacing should be 12-20 feet. Distance between plants in the shrub row should be 3-5 feet for deciduous species; if juniper is used for a shrub row, space plants 5-7 feet apart. For interior rows, space evergreens 8-12 feet apart and deciduous trees 10-14 feet apart.

What happens if a plant doesn't have space? ›

A plant's roots need space so that they can spread out and absorb water and nutrients. Its leaves need space so that they access light. When plants grow too close together, they have to compete for these resources.

Why is space a limiting factor for plants? ›

The amount of space in which a plant grows determines whether the plant can get the sunlight, water, and soil nutrients it needs. For example, many small plants sprout each year in a forest. But as they grow, the roots of those that are too close together run out of space and some of the plants will die.

What does it mean to space plants? ›

Find your 'recommended spacing'

The recommended spacing is how much space one plant takes up or the space you will need between each hole in the ground when planting. Plants need to be spaced a certain distance from one another to allow space for them to grow.

What is the rule of spacing? ›

In general, every word gets a single space before and after it, except there is no space between punctuation that "belongs" to that word (like those quotes).

What are the advantages of spacing? ›

The spacing effect demonstrates that learning is more effective when repeated in spaced-out sessions. By repeating and spacing out information individuals learn, they can better recall that information in the future.

Why is the spacing effect effective? ›

The Spacing Effect is the phenomenon by which long-term retention improves when study or review sessions are spaced out, as opposed to done all in one sitting. The “Forgetting Curve.” This is a simple negative-sloping curve by which learning content loses its retrieval strength over time.

What is the rule of 3 in gardening? ›

Three plants creates balance

Three plants in a row is dull because you know what to expect. If you have enough space, group them in an equilateral triangle. This looks particularly good with mounding or vertical plants. Be sure to leave some space between the plants, especially if they are three different kinds.

What happens if you space plants too close? ›

If you plant flowers too close together, the plants get stressed and are prone to diseases, Kole says. If air can't properly circulate and the plants can't dry out between waterings, fungus sets in. Roots can rot. And once plants are weakened from stress, insects move in.

Why is row spacing important? ›

Planting Pattern, Row Spacing, and Crop Density

Generally, wider row spacing will enhance the ability of crop plants for light, soil moisture, soil nutrients, and soil-borne pathogens (Blackshaw et al., 2007; Dunphy and Van Duyn, 2014).

How does spacing affect the health of plants? ›

Crop spacing can directly affect the stem development of the crop. The distance between the plants affects the availability of light, water, and nutrients that each plant receives, which can affect stem growth.

What happens if a plant does not have enough space to grow? ›

A plant's roots need space so that they can spread out and absorb water and nutrients. Its leaves need space so that they access light. When plants grow too close together, they have to compete for these resources.

What is the reason for having different spacing for different crops? ›

Some of the reasons for the proper distance are included; This allows plants to develop their full potential on the ground and on the ground. Enough space ensures less competition for sunlight, water and fertilizers. The difference can also prevent the spread of plants and diseases from one pest to another.

Top Articles
Latest Posts
Article information

Author: Errol Quitzon

Last Updated:

Views: 6288

Rating: 4.9 / 5 (79 voted)

Reviews: 86% of readers found this page helpful

Author information

Name: Errol Quitzon

Birthday: 1993-04-02

Address: 70604 Haley Lane, Port Weldonside, TN 99233-0942

Phone: +9665282866296

Job: Product Retail Agent

Hobby: Computer programming, Horseback riding, Hooping, Dance, Ice skating, Backpacking, Rafting

Introduction: My name is Errol Quitzon, I am a fair, cute, fancy, clean, attractive, sparkling, kind person who loves writing and wants to share my knowledge and understanding with you.