Plant your vegetables, water, then wait-easy, right? It can get even easier and more remunerative if one just gives a companion planting a little nod. Companion planting does far more than raise the fashion ante in the garden where aesthetics and practicality come together in the potager garden.
It’s as if there was one single invisible conductor conducting this symphony of growth, flavor, and even pest control. Let me spill the beans-that’s how nature magic lets the yields increase.
Ever felt that tomatoes and basil were more than just the best of ingredient buddies making that pasta sauce? Well, in the garden, they are. Basil doesn’t just keep those ugly bugs away from your tomato plants; it even seems to whisper sweet nothings for a rise in tomato flavor. Taste buds are not on any wild goose chase either, for indeed, there really is some proper science behind this.
Then there’s the other dynamic duo of carrots and onions. Like Batman and Robin, they fight off carrot and onion flies that act like the Dynamic Duo’s nemesis and help make life easier in the garden. Sweet, right? The plants look after each other, sort of like a vegetative buddy cop movie!
Each of the many thousands of possible combinations has special magic all its own. The marigolds serve principally as the velvet rope bouncers of the veggie club-keeping varmints born in the dirt off the dance floor. Even the wee nematodes think better of a change in dining venue. Plant them around your crops and thank them later.
Plant beans with the corn, too, while one is at it. Beans are great at fixing nitrogen in the soil, hence sharing its wealth, while corn provides a structure or lean-on to the beanstalks. Talk about being a good neighbor!
Not only do herbs help add flavor and freshness to food, but they indeed are the superheroes of your garden too. Plant some mints among cabbages, actually-the herb is too much for those cabbage moths. Mind you, mint does tend to grow a little unruly, forgetting all about order. It’s your job to keep it in line!
But flowers, of course. Yes, they do add color, but more to the point, they actually attract some desirable attention-those really key ingredients, the pollinators in that delightful garden stew called productivity. Sunflowers lure in bees that later get to undertake the job of their pollination. It is teamwork if ever there was teamwork!
Not all is roses, though. Some plants simply don’t get along. Add in fennel to your vegetables, and it would be like calling the drama queen into the family reunion. Fennel tends to be allelopathically discouraging for most other plants. Save yourself from the drama in the garden soap opera; keep it on the sidelines.
It is not, however, at the mercy of nature. A little attention paid to pairing the plants turns out superior results, fresher than the garden alone can’t replicate. Move away from high-tech fertilizers and into this age-old strategy that still proves its worth today.
Potager Paradise: Creative Plant Combinations for Abundant Produce by Jonathon Edwards
The potager garden: so replete with harmony and dynamic beauty, the many plants mingling and growing together companionably. Planting a potager-or even just a kitchen garden-is so very much more than the actual planting of things in the earth, crossing your fingers, and praying for rain. The concept really involves weaving a tapestry that looks nice, with flavors and scents melding together in harmony-quite a symphony of scents in harmony.
Well, the idea of a potager garden originally came from across the ocean, where our French friends combined vegetables, herbs, fruits, and flowers in such a way that the taste buds and senses went into some crazy delight. So, now what your potager should look like, whom shall we invite to this green party?
Of course, first, the classics: tomatoes and basil. Together, they are more than just besties in your caprese salad; they complement one another in planting. Basil’s aromatic oils act all over, something like some kind of delicate bodyguard fending off pests from doing less noble acts toward your juicy tomatoes. Tomatoes cascading from their vines make basil look even better! But apparently, tomatoes aren’t the only prima donnas in the vegetable world. Plant carrots with dill, and voilà-the two become the best marriage in town. Dill enhances the brilliant carrot flavor and invites in insects that are helpful. Like the ever-chivalrous ladybugs dining on the invading aphids. Just as the paparazzi at a star-studded gala get pressed in uninvited and mobbed by security! Consider a few companions: the ‘Three Sisters‘ are three famous sisters–corn, beans and squash. The corn provides the scaffold upon which the beans can spiral and twirl. The beans offer the nitrogen that the corn is quite fond of. Squash spreads out below tucking large leaves in to shade and conserve moisture like a natural mulch.
Meanwhile, the mint is wanton, riotous, and inebriates cabbages. While cabbages are plotting against the heads of cabbages, aromatic mint may chase off moths that could be dancing in with aromatic fumes. Mint could be that forward neighbor erecting a fence against nosy trespassers. Let us not forget the blossoming beauties! Meanwhile, marigolds dance through the garden, their gold petals full of value, repelling nematodes among other party crashers via a chemical in their roots that will leave the troublemakers at the door. Add in an aromatic lavender border, and one brings into the yard party beneficial bugs to ensure everyone plays nice. Plant rosemary next to your beans if you like a little magic.
Rosemary has some powerful needles that give strength by putting a hex on bean beetles. Introduce stunning purple aubergine with soft sage. The eggplants are a statement, but sumptuous textures backlit by deep purple skin, softly whispering sage borders that keep them company and keep off the flea beetles that try to sabotage their bedfellows. And of course, summer-evening dinners are just so much better when a sprig of fresh sage is included in them. Most evocative of all, probably, though, is a very freaky yet strong combination of roses and garlic. Garlic fumes create an aura shielding the roses against aphids and mildew. These are some kind of an odd couple, somewhat mismatched but so harmonious.
