Radish spacing question

After reading Mel's book, I am a bit confused with regards to the thinking on radish spacing. Early on, he explains all about how to come up with spacing in general. If plants in rows would be 6" apart, then space 6" in both directions, so 4 per square foot. If 3" apart in row gardneing, then in SFG it is 3" each direction so 16 per square foot. He says check the seeding instructions for the seeds in question to decide which spacing. But then for radishes, in his charts he says 16 per square foot. But I read all over the place that radishes should be between 1 and 3 inches spacing when in rows, and my seed packet specifically says 2 inch spacing in rows. So is there some reason I really need to do only 16 per square foot? 2 inch spacing would be 36. Splitting the difference and doing them 5X5 would give me 25. That's a big difference in number of radishes for a very small change in spacing.

Anyone with any explanations of reasons to limit to only 16?

Thanks,

-Ed

I have no explanation but that I think Mel was giving guidelines and trying to keep it simple. I suggest going ahead with the thicker sowing and make observations. You may always thin the seedlings or harvest small radish and let others get larger.

I am planning 2 squares of radishes in the early season, and 2 squares again in the fall. I like the observations idea. I will try each square foot differently each season and observe the growth and I can report back in the summer and fall on the results.

My guess was that to keep it simple Mel simply made everything 1, 4, 9, or 16 and stopped there. My gut says that radishes will be successful at 25 at least, and I will still try one square at 36 and see what happens. So the first two will be 25 and 36, and if 36 doesn't do well in the first crop, then in the fall I can try 16 and 25.

-Ed


-Ed

I was also thinking about radish spacing when I read in the book about 16 per square. I like the idea of 25. I think I will give that a try; 25 is a good compromise. Camprn also has a good idea about thinning/early harvest of some if more intense planting idea does not work out.