Sunflower and pole bean incompatible??? I hope not, I just planted them together a couple of weeks ago. Beans came up, no sunflower yet. Oh well, we'll have to see what happens.

This will be my first year growing corn, but from everything I've read about it, 4x4 with fairly tight spacing is about the minimum for getting good pollination. I think in a slightly bigger bed it could work, but 4x4 might be pushing it, providing extra space for the squash. At that size block, you'll want to hand pollinate, too.

Also, read up on spacing for corn. Mel's spacings are thought to be too close by many people, but it will also depend on the variety of corn you're growing and the fertility of the soil. I'm planting mine on 1' centers, which most people seem to agree is enough space for most varieties. There are some smaller varieties you could look into, also.

I've planted corn on 1' spacing and thought it did fine, with lots of compost feedings. I'm trying the 3 sisters thing this year too, from what I understand you want to give your corn a head start before planting the pole beans and feed well. Good luck I'll be anxious to find out how it works for you. I checked my companion planting book about sunflowers and here is what I found. Where grass is growing in close proximity sunflower germination may be inhibited. They produce a substance that inhibits nitrogen fixing-bacteria in the soil, delaying succeeeding plants and grasses. Sunflowers and potatoes should not be grown together--potatoes likely to have phytophthora blight. Sunflowers and pole beans should not be planted together since both compete for space and light with resulting poor growth. Sunflowers are good with corn insects are reduced for both. Cucumbers and sunflowers do well together --sunflower providing break from the wind or provide shade, both cucumbers and sunflowers need the nitrogen so feed well though. Sounds to me like if you put the sunflowers in the corners of the plot and gave them some space away from the beans you would be fine, and even benefitial to the corn. --Think that is what I might do. (This is from Carrots love tomatoes and roses love garlic.)

This is a really interesting read with diagrams and such.

Heidi

Here is a link that might be useful: Buffalo Womans Garden

I'm trying corn spacing of 1', with 4 beans planted in each SF, and 1 squash in the middle of a 2x2 block. A 2x2 block, hence, has 4 corn, 16 beans, and 1 squash. It looks so good on paper. I'm doing it in a 4'X8' square. That's 32 corn, 8 squash, and 128 beans!! We'll see how it does. (;