Flowers add an element of beauty to the vegetable garden and with the right selection, you can attract beneficial insects and discourage some of the harmful ones. With just a little preparation, a few trellises and the openness to jump putting in formal rows, your vegetable garden may double as a flower garden and be a gorgeous addition to the landscape.
Planing Ahead
Developing a gorgeous garden starts with good preparation. Rather than planting large regions with rows of vegetables, plan to plant in a scattered pattern, mixing different kinds of vegetables together. A couple of trellises — tipi kind trellises scattered across the garden or tall trellises round the perimeter — add height to your garden, making a visually interesting element. Trellises are ideal for growing crops such as beans and peas, summer squash, melons and vine tomato plants. Creating raised beds from wood, stone or other aesthetically pleasing substances is a great way to make the flower and vegetable garden stand out nicely and makes weeding easier.
Pick Your Crop for Color
Not all cabbage is green and not all strawberries are reddish. Think colour combinations when planting a gorgeous vegetable and flower garden. Yellow tomatoes mixed with crimson tomatoes bring colour variation from the tomato section while eggplants, purple cabbage, and orange, yellow and red hot and sweet peppers add colour throughout the backyard. A stand of sunflowers adds height and color, while chives, squash flowers, nasturtium, calendula petals and violets offer edible flowers. Rose petals can also be edible and a growing or bush rose from the garden adds elegance just like few other flowers may.
Companion Planting Principles
Companion planting is a way to reduce the demand for pesticides by attracting beneficial insects to the garden. Flowers like marigolds, nasturtiums, chive flowers and pot marigold, also referred to as calendula, attract insects that deter some of the worst garden insects. Strongly fragrant herbs, such as rosemary, oregano, mint and catnip, can also be great at deterring garden pests. Incorporating companion planting clinics from the vegetable garden helps keep insects away and you get the added advantage of the herb garden mixed in with the grasses and creamy flowers.
Great Companions from the Garden
Plant nasturtiums one of the plant and cucumbers the cucumbers beneath the sunflowers; the sunflowers provide shade for the cucumbers and the nasturtiums maintain cucumber beetles away. Marigolds are a wonderful ally of eggplants, melons, tomatoes and raspberries. Borage, love-in-the-mist and thyme are great companions to this strawberry, and chives paired with celery, carrots and lettuce form a fantastic combination. Plant a couple of added chives around roses to keep aphids at bay and revel in the purple chive flowers one of your favorite roses.