Summer Shade Salad

A polyculture - the species are claimed to help each other, and each claim below names its mechanism.

A derived composition (O132 team 7, adopted 2026-09-02): the extension advice to plant long-season lettuce where sweet corn or staked tomatoes shade it in the hottest part of the day (University of Maryland, 'Growing Lettuce in a Home Garden'; NC State Extension Gardener Handbook ch. 16), laid out as one bed.

What binds this planting

The corpus partly backs this planting with 1 graded mechanism its members share:

Heat bolters that tolerate part sun, such as lettuce and spinach, are better off in the computed summer shadow of a taller neighbour than in open sun.

Plan this guild →

Space it needs

At least 4 m²43.1 ft². A bed smaller than that does not get this guild quietly substituted for something else — the planner greys it out, says why, and offers the nearest adaptation that does fit.

What it looks like planted

29 × lettuce
29 × corn

The real placement, on an example 8 ft bed - the same layout the planner draws.

Between seasons

Nothing is left living in the bed over winter; the whole planting is re-established.

What it claims

the tall crop's midsummer shadow shelters the greens from the heat that makes them bolt

Promising

Mechanism: Leaf temperature. Shade from a taller crop lowers the leaf and soil temperature of the greens beneath it, and high summer temperature is the trigger that sends these species to seed and turns them bitter.

Evidence: confirmed against 5 sources in the research-based literature.

the 5 sources

University of Maryland Extension, 'Growing Lettuce in a Home Garden', extension.umd.edu/resource/growing-lettuce-home-garden (fetched in-container 2026-09-02; read by the maintainer 2026-09-02): 'Increasing day-length and high summer temperatures usually cause seedstalk formation (bolting) and bitter flavor'; 'Plant long-season lettuces so that crops such as sweet corn, staked tomatoes, pole beans, or deciduous trees will shade the lettuce during the hottest part of the day'; 'Plant successive lettuce crops in spring and use tall crops and trellises to protect the late spring lettuce plantings from direct afternoon sun'; 'Tolerates partial shade (4-6 hours of direct light/day) but grows well with full sun in spring and fall.'

NC State Extension Gardener Handbook, chapter 16 'Vegetable Gardening', content.ces.ncsu.edu/extension-gardener-handbook/16-vegetable-gardening (fetched in-container 2026-09-02; read by the maintainer 2026-09-02): 'Shade-tolerant species, such as lettuce, spinach, and celery, can be planted in the shadow of taller crops, like beans or squash.'

Penn State Extension, 'Heat Proofing Your Vegetable Garden', extension.psu.edu/heat-proofing-your-vegetable-garden (fetched in-container 2026-09-02; read by the maintainer 2026-09-02): 'A good investment if you want to grow lettuce and other leafy greens all through the summer is a shade cloth'; 'For most vegetables, a shade cloth of 30% to 50% is recommended.' Of fall brassica seedlings, not lettuce: 'They are best planted along a shade barrier or under taller vegetables to protect them from direct hot sun, especially the hot afternoon sun.'

Clemson HGIC, 'Lettuce', hgic.clemson.edu/factsheet/lettuce/ (fetched in-container 2026-09-02; read by the maintainer 2026-09-02): 'High summer temperatures usually cause seed stalk formation (bolting) and bitter flavor'; 'If this crop is exposed to high temperature or moisture stress, the lettuce will usually have a bitter flavor and will also bolt.'

Clemson HGIC, 'Spinach', hgic.clemson.edu/factsheet/spinach/ (fetched in-container 2026-09-02; read by the maintainer 2026-09-02): 'Plant spinach in early spring to avoid high temperatures and long days, which cause the plants to bolt, or form flower stalks.'

Roles

A role is filled by whatever satisfies its predicate, not by a fixed species list. The canonical filler is the default; the alternatives are priced.

Shade

Canonical: Corn
Alternatives: Sunflower, Tomato
What the alternative costs: A giant sunflower casts the shade, but its residue suppresses the small-seeded greens sown beside it; an indeterminate tomato needs a stake to stand that tall and is a heavy feeder. Neither needs the corn's pollination block.

Bolter

Canonical: Lettuce
Alternatives: Spinach

What it costs the ground

Rotation history attaches to the ground, not the bed, so this is what the planner remembers about this patch after the guild comes out.

Grasses: full load
Daisy Family: partial load
Amaranth Family: partial load

Rules that gate it

Well established

Corn requires a block of at least 4 rows (roughly 12 plants) for adequate kernel set.

fatal if ignored → block

Mechanism: Maize is wind-pollinated and protandrous. Tassels shed pollen that must land on silks of neighbouring plants. Below roughly 12 plants in a block of at least 4 rows, insufficient pollen reaches enough silks; each unfertilized silk is one missing kernel.

Evidence: confirmed against 4 sources in the research-based literature.

the 4 sources

UMN Extension, 'Growing sweet corn in home gardens', extension.umn.edu/vegetables/growing-sweet-corn (read 2026-07-11): 'Always plant corn in blocks of at least four rows. Corn planted in a single row will have much of its pollen blown out of the row, and will produce ears that have blank areas where kernels did not form.'

NC State Extension, 'Organic Sweet Corn Production' (Horticulture Information Leaflets), content.ces.ncsu.edu/organic-sweet-corn-production (read 2026-07-11): 'Corn is wind-pollinated and should be planted in blocks of at least 4 rows for good pollination to occur.'

UMD Extension, 'Growing Sweet Corn in a Home Garden', extension.umd.edu/resource/growing-sweet-corn-home-garden (read 2026-07-11): 'Plant in blocks of at least three to four short rows, rather than one or two long rows, to ensure good pollination; minimum of three rows side by side (preferably four rows).'

Clemson HGIC 1308, 'Sweet Corn' (updated 2023-01-23), hgic.clemson.edu/factsheet/sweet-corn (read 2026-07-11): 'This crop is wind-pollinated; therefore, plant in blocks of several rows rather than 1 or 2 long rows to ensure full ears.'

remedy

Plant in a block of at least 4 rows, or omit corn and substitute a trellis.

Read the full rule → · open in the planner ↗

Promising

A guild deposits family history across its whole footprint.

costly if ignored → warn

Mechanism: Soilborne inoculum and overwintering pest stages disperse across the bed. A guild dominated by one family forecloses that ground for that family's rotation interval.

Evidence: confirmed against 2 sources in the research-based literature.

the 2 sources

Same soilborne-persistence basis as other rules here (read 2026-07-11): NC State Extension (Verticillium microsclerotia 'can survive in the soil without a host for up to 10 years'; Septoria/early blight 'overwinter on infected tomato debris and solanaceous weed hosts') and UMN/Ohioline (squash bug overwinters 'as adults in sheltered places ... they fly to growing cucurbit plants'; squash vine borer 'overwinters in the soil as a pupa').

Those sources establish that inoculum and pest stages persist in the ground and are not confined to the exact spot a plant occupied; this rule applies that persistence across the whole guild footprint. The whole-footprint attribution is the corpus's rotation geometry (history attaches to ground, not to the individual plant — see the data model), not a claim from an external source.

remedy

Rotate the whole bed the guild occupied, not just the rows that family grew in.

Read the full rule → · open in the planner ↗

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