Crop rotation
Crop rotation for brassicas
The short answer
Keep every brassica, including radish, turnip, swede, rocket and mustard, out of a bed that had brassicas recently. The RHS rotation plans move brassicas on each year and put them after peas and beans. Once clubroot is in the soil, rotation slows it but won't clear it: the RHS says its spores can last up to 20 years.
The cabbage family is bigger than it looks. Turnips, swede, radish, rocket, pak choi and mustard are all in it, and they all share clubroot.
Which crops count
Cabbage family (Brassicaceae)
Broccoli, Brussels Sprout, Cabbage, Cauliflower, Chinese Cabbage, Kale, Kohlrabi, Mizuna, Mustard, Pak choi, Purple Sprouting Broccoli, Radish, Rocket, Swede, Turnip, and 29 more entries in Vercro's catalogue.
In Vercro's rotation check: High: Vercro marks same-family crops to wait for about a year after this family.
What lasts in the soil, and for how long
| Problem | How long it can last | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Clubroot resting spores | Up to 20 years | RHS, club root |
What rotation can and can't do
Rotation keeps clubroot from building up where it hasn't taken hold. It can't clean infected ground within any normal rotation, because 20 years is longer than any plan. The RHS management advice for an infected plot is to lime acid soil, improve drainage, grow resistant varieties and avoid moving soil around on boots and tools.
Clubroot also lives on relatives you might not count: the RHS lists wallflowers, stocks and the weed shepherd's purse among its hosts.
Where it fits in a rotation
The RHS three and four year plans put brassicas after peas and beans, which leave some nitrogen in the soil for them. After brassicas, the three-year plan moves to potatoes. See three and four bed plans.
Worth knowing
Mustard green manure
Mustard is a brassica. The RHS says not to follow it with other brassicas, because it could encourage clubroot.Radish as a gap-filler
Sow radishes inside the brassica bed rather than elsewhere, so the family stays together.Long occupancy
Winter brassicas can hold a bed from late spring to the next spring, which affects what the bed can do next.Resistant varieties
On a plot that already has clubroot, the RHS lists resistant cultivars among the ways to keep growing brassicas.
What Vercro checks, and what it doesn't
Vercro's taxonomy puts turnip, radish, rocket, swede and mustard in the cabbage family even though its catalogue files some of them as roots or salads. So the rotation check catches the mistake rotation exists to prevent: a careful brassica rotation followed by turnips.
No three-year chart
Vercro checks a bed's own history when you plan it, and can name a free bed where a family hasn't grown. It won't plan next year's rotation for you, and it doesn't draw a fixed multi-year chart, because a year of garden records can't support one.
Frequently asked questions
Keep going
Where this comes from
Crop windows, growing times and plant families come from Vercro's own curated crop catalogue, the same data the Vercro app uses. Where a published source says something different, we show both rather than choosing the convenient one. Reviewed 19 September 2026.
- Club root, Royal Horticultural Society. Read 19 September 2026.
- Crop rotation, Royal Horticultural Society. Read 19 September 2026.
- Green manures, Royal Horticultural Society. Read 19 September 2026.
Let Vercro spot the hidden brassicas
Vercro knows a turnip is a brassica. When you plan a bed, it checks the family history and says so.