- Companion planting or inter planting is a
powerful gardening technique that I think confuses a lot
of first time gardeners. But if you think about it, it's really been practiced probably since the dawn of agriculture itself. Think about something like beans and corn. Pole beans are needing
something to climb up. Corn provides that stock and also sort of protects those beans. Then you add something
like squash to ground cover and sort of shade that entire system. And voila, you have the three
sisters method of planting that indigenous Americans came
up with so many years ago. But while some combinations
are intuitive like that or maybe something like
tomatoes with flowers, so that bees come by and
help pollinate the tomatoes, there are some really
science-based companion planting ideas that are
somewhat counterintuitive. And that's exactly what we're gonna talk about in today's video. As I stand here under my rose arch, it's tempting to the eye to think, wow, this plant's just kind of
blowing around in the wind. It's not doing anything. But that couldn't be
further from the truth. Not only is it actively
growing at all times, but it is actively
trying to protect itself from would be predators. Take roses, for example. If you zoom in, you'll
see there's some thorns on my Cécile Brunner climbing rose. That's gonna dissuade pests from chomping down on those canes. It's gonna dissuade
little rodents from maybe building a nest or a bird
from building a nest. And honestly, even myself,
I'm gonna have to strap on some pretty heavy duty gloves if I want to prune that rose and be safe. But it is not only visible
mechanisms that plants use to protect themselves
from pests or predators. Believe it or not, some plants can actually
inhibit weeds on their own. They don't need you to come in and spray. Cucumbers is actually
a great example of that to the point where a good combination is taking cucumbers and putting them in between your tomatoes in
your summer tomato garden. It's kind of funky, but
they actually produce allele chemicals which inhibit
weeds and other seedlings. And notice I say other seedlings, which means other edible
stuff that you might want to grow might not be a fantastic
idea to plant right next to a cucumber, not only
for the inhibition effect, but also because they're gonna
produce all of these leaves that are gonna block light
that will also inhibit weeds. So you can think about these combinations that are a little counterintuitive, but produce an interesting result. When looking at planting for weed control and these interesting
companion planting ideas, looking at farmers is
often a good indication, especially if they're organic farmers because they make their living doing this, so they better be doing a good job. And speaking of, you get into
this crop called winter rye. Winter rye has 16 chemicals that are known to inhibit seed germination, but only at that stage. You can actually put in a large tomato and it's
gonna be completely fine. So a lot of farmers, they'll
put winter rye in the winter, let it grow, and then chop it on down, and it inhibits most of the common weeds that
they're going to experience. Something like foxtail or purse lane. So it's something that you could think about sprinkling in your row. Next up, trap crops and the name is very
self-explanatory in this case. I'm actually standing above one right now, one of my favorites,
which would be Nasturtium. They can sometimes suck up the attention of unwanted pests that
might attack your brassicas like an aphid or something like that. But another interesting idea is, if you suffer from flea beetles, which might be hitting your
tomatoes in the summer, you can plant radishes
or Bok choy near them. Flea beetles tend to like
those a little bit more and they will sort of attack
those and leave the plant you actually want to grow
a little bit more intact. So it's a little counterintuitive. You're planting something
edible that you want less around the thing that you want more, that the pest also wants more. So flea beetles, Bok choy and
radish is a good combination. Another one is taking tomatoes and putting cowpeas next to them, if you're dealing with
something like a stink bug. If you see stink bugs
all up in your tomatoes, throw some cowpeas down. They like cowpeas way more. They'll go on over to the cowpeas and then you can actually pick
up and collect the stink bugs and extinguish them so
that they don't reproduce. So another example of a weirdly counterintuitive combo that serves the purpose
of preventing a pest. My favorite example of this trap crop idea is
actually a positive one and it's taking alyssum, sweet alyssum, and planting it next to
things like tomatoes. Why? Not because a pest is
attracted to the alyssum. It's actually because the pest of a pest is attracted to the alyssum. A braconid wasp really loves to be on and around that alyssum, but what it will do is it will
find tomato hornworms nearby and lay its eggs in the back
of the tomato horn worm. Little gruesome, a little freaky, a little raw nature there, but it is true. And you'll see these white
little balls kind of hanging out on the back of its tomato hornworm, that's actually the eggs of the wasp, which will kill the hornworm for you. And then the larva of those
eggs can destroy aphids, which of course can also
impact your tomatoes. So not only does it
beautify that combination, it's a very pretty plant, very beautiful, but it has this crazy benefit
of automatic pest prevention. Some crops like this
beautiful Brassica right here and even more specifically
within the Brassica family, mustards have what's called a
bio fumigant property to them. There's a compound called isothiocyanate within this family of crops specifically, that not only gives it that bitter taste that we either know and love or know and tolerate depending on
your particular tastes, but it also helps control fungal diseases or soil borne diseases like
verticillium or fusarium. So if you plant this or
companion plant this, with a particular plant that might suffer from it, it can help. But this is also why
you see specific types of Brassicas thrown into
like a cover crop mix that you'll throw onto a bed at the end of a season and
just let it chop and drop. It's because when tilled
back into the soil, it's really effective at controlling those soil-borne diseases. Some companion planting combos
actually improve the quality of your soil, either the nutrient density, of it or the texture of it. And we're looking at one of the most famous ones right
here, peas and beans, legumes. What they'll do is they'll fix nitrogen. Basically, they'll take
atmospheric nitrogen in the air and affix it to themselves, and then eventually when they die, it's broken down into the soil. So it's not as simple as just, hey, you planted some peas magically. There's more nitrogen in your soil. So let's talk about a couple
combinations that really work. So how do you use nitrogen
fixers correctly in the garden? You've got things like
bush beans, cow peas, and our personal favorite
would be fava beans. Here's how to do it. What happens in the actual plant is that the nitrogen is fixed to these nodules that
are around the root zone. So while the plant's growing,
yeah, you could plant beans and I don't know,
tomatoes at the same time and there'll be some level
of additional nitrogen, but it really isn't a ton. It's actually better to
grow those plants ahead of the crop that you're
going to put in next. So beans or fava beans,
especially since they like to grow during those colder months, when you cut them down you
don't rip the roots out. You just can't do that because, of course, all the nitrogen is in the
nodules, which is in the roots. You can cut 'em down to the
ground, don't rip the roots out, leave them in, and then
plant into that area. And then you'll actually get some of that nitrogen fixation benefit. So if you're looking for a very clear companion planting idea, you can take corn and fava beans, plant fava beans, maybe there, there and there, on the outside edges and on the interior and then you could take corn after the fava have
really started to grow, maybe gotten close to the end of their life and sew it
down the middle like that. So they get to benefit from the
fixation that's taken place. A lot of gardeners struggle
to get good pollination, maybe on their cucumbers or their squash, and this is where thinking
of the garden not just as a place to grow your
groceries, is really key. I'll be honest, when I
first started gardening I was like, if I can't eat it, why the hell would I grow? It makes no sense, but in fact it's completely the opposite. You need to be planting flowers of all different shapes,
heights, sizes, colors, as long as they're not invasive or harmful in your region, in your garden, and you can plant them
in all different ways. For example, in this bed,
this is sort of a mixed bed. It's not exactly set up
for spring quite yet, but I've got some xenias. I have some other stuff
hanging out in the midst of some of my winter stuff that's finishing up. Now when I put in some summer stuff, well, this is gonna do really well in attracting some beneficial,
some bees, some butterflies, some moths, all that kind of stuff. It is not just about
improving pollination, it's also improving the
beautification of your garden, which is something that quite
frankly, I'm still working on. So things like this,
planting on the edge of a bed and allowing it to spill and trail over. This is just starting its journey, but certainly is well on its way. Making a state and peace
in the middle and then planting some things that might
benefit from the beneficials that are around it on the perimeter might make a lot of sense. Now, to be honest with you,
this is an entire video, maybe many videos of flour
and vegetable combinations that work really well. But even something as simple
guys as taking a tomato and putting basil next to it, you get a little bit of of
a companion benefit there, not only for you know the garden, but also for the kitchen, of course. And so you might be companion planting without even knowing it. There's much more to talk about here. If you're really looking for
some interesting pollinators, I encourage you to check
out botanical interests, which is our seed company. We have all sorts of different packs, regional, specific, very targeted ones. So take a look at that. Until next time, good luck in the garden and keep on growing.
