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WonderIndigenous food ecology fact

The 'Three Sisters' are maize, beans and squash, planted together by Indigenous farmers of the Americas so that each crop helps the others grow.

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HistoryScienceFood

The story behind the card

All three crops were first domesticated in Mesoamerica, today's Mexico and Central America: squash about 10,000 years ago, then maize and beans over the following thousands of years. Growing them together later spread across much of North America. Each plant has a job. The maize stalk is a pole for the bean vine to climb; bacteria living in small lumps on the bean roots turn nitrogen from the air into a form plants can use, which enriches the soil; and the broad squash leaves shade the ground, keeping it moist and holding back weeds. Among the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) of the north-east, the crops appear in stories as three sisters who thrive only together, and a modern experiment found that their traditional mixed planting produced more food energy and protein than any of the crops grown alone.

Türkçe oku
Amerika'nın yerli çiftçileri mısır, fasulye ve kabağı aynı tarlada birlikte eker. Birbirinin büyümesine yardım eden bu üç bitkiye “Üç Kız Kardeş” denir.

Bu üç bitki ilk olarak Mezoamerika'da, yani bugünkü Meksika ve Orta Amerika'da evcilleştirildi: Önce, yaklaşık 10.000 yıl önce kabak, sonraki binlerce yıl içinde de mısır ve fasulye. Üçünü birlikte ekmek zamanla Kuzey Amerika'nın büyük bölümüne yayıldı. Her bitkinin bir görevi vardır. Mısır sapı, tırmanan fasulyeye sırık olur; fasulye köklerindeki küçük yumrularda yaşayan bakteriler havadaki azotu bitkilerin kullanabileceği hâle getirip toprağı zenginleştirir; kabağın geniş yaprakları da toprağı gölgeleyip nemini korur ve yabani otları bastırır. Kuzeydoğudaki Haudenosaunee (İrokua) halkının anlatılarında bu bitkiler, ancak birlikteyken gelişen üç kız kardeştir. Modern bir deney, bu geleneksel karışık ekimin, bitkilerin her birini tek başına ekmekten daha fazla besin enerjisi ve protein verdiğini gösterdi.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: Three Sisters (agriculture)
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