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Friendly Plants Make Garden Party

Photo by Monica Brandies

Columnist Monica Brandies’ son, Mike Brandies, carried potted tomato plants in an out from his porch at least three times this winter to protect them from frost. He will be happier when he is picking tomatoes, she says.

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By MONICA BRANDIES

Tribune correspondent

Published: March 11, 2009

Many people are digging in to get through these hard economic times the best way they can.

This includes several of my grown children. Most of them always have had gardens filled with flowers and vegetables, but edibles are now taking top priority. The results are good eating, good health and a pleasant, sensible way to save money.

My son Mike Brandies, and daughter Gretchen and her family, whom many of you know from visiting my open gardens, are way ahead of me on this.

Mike was bringing his dad, David, and I green beans until the Jan. 21 freeze. He already has some up again and another planting sprouting.

It was his huge pots of tomatoes surrounded by carrots - which he carried in and out of the patio at least three times during the frosts - that reminded me about companion planting.

This is a concept I applied as much as possible when I had big vegetable gardens while my kids were growing up. We grew 90 percent of the food for our family, which at times included 10 people for dinner. (Teresa wasn't born until three of the older ones had moved out on their own.)

What we couldn't grow on our own acreage we usually replaced with what we could. Even after we moved to a small lot in town, we ate largely from the garden.

Here is how companion planting can result in easier tending, greater production and fewer troubles:

One plant will help ward off the enemies of another, or take the damage itself. Some plants go well together because they provide mutual support or a compatible arrangement of sharing sun and shade.

Some plants just seem to like one neighbor better than another. Science doesn't have all the answers, but experience - dating back to times when none of the answers science now has were widely known - has come up with many well-honored combinations.

•Beans prefer beets, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower and cucumbers nearby. Check out a fascinating book titled "Carrots Love Tomatoes" by Louise Riotte.

•Cabbage likes potatoes, which few of us raise here, but Mike had some come through the frost. Cabbage also likes dill, sage, mints and chamomile to ward off voracious insects. The whole cabbage family hates strawberries and doesn't care much for tomatoes or beans.

•Carrots like lettuce and chives, and dislike dill.

•Chives don't take to peas, but they are good around rosebushes. Their onionlike scent helps keep bugs away.

•Corn supports beans and peas and makes good use of space with melons, squash, cukes or pumpkins spreading between rows. We had some beautiful cucumbers hanging beside ears of corn when we lived up north. I no longer grow either, but my children do here in Florida.

•Eggplant likes green beans.

•Radishes like peas, lettuce and chervil.

•Spinach likes strawberries.

•Tomatoes thrive with parsley, cabbage and carrots.

•Marigolds seem to help everything. Plant a short row and then transplant extras to any open spot in the garden. They even help the soil.

You don't have to erect barriers. Just keep everyone congenially mixing as if at a party. And when you have a bumper crop, make note of what is growing around it and repeat the combination.

Some strawberry farmers plant onions at the end of every row. When I asked one grower why, he said, "To make money." But there could be other reasons as well.

Today's Pick

Chives are great in the garden and the kitchen. I used to grow the common variety, Allium schoenoprasum, among my rosebushes to repel insects. It stays low and has lovely, cloverlike blooms of lavender in the spring. It was not until I came to Florida that I discovered garlic chive, Allium tuberosum, with wider, flat leaves that grow to about 18 inches and have pretty, rose-scented white flowers in 2-inch flat clusters. These have proven much longer-lived and more reliable in Florida for me. The flowers are nice enough for bouquets, and they produce more foliage. I've had the same plants for a dozen years, through cold, heat, rain and drought, while the shorter chives only live for a year at most. Both varieties can be started from seeds or divisions, but it is easiest to buy a nice plant and let it spread. Chives do well in full sun to partial shade and respond to enriched soil. They also tolerate a good bit of neglect. Frequent watering will keep the leaf tips from yellowing. They are members of the lily family, cousins of the onion but much milder.

Now's The Time To ...

•Remember that another concept that helps in a vegetable garden is crop rotation. Different plants take different nutrients out of the soil and put different ones back. So it makes sense to plant heavy feeders, like plants in the cabbage family, where legumes such as peas and beans enriched the soil last year. Also, by moving things about, pests and disease are less likely.

•Be sure to plant varieties of vegetables that do well in Florida. Stop at the Hillsborough County Extension Office in Seffner and ask for their "Planting Guide for Vegetable Gardens." But add one more piece of advice to their recommendations: Roma beans are our favorites because they taste so good and fill the kettle quicker with less shelling - and they do very well here.

Upcoming Events

•The Suncoast Native Plant Society meets at 7 p.m. March 18 at the Hillsborough County Extension Office, 5339 County Road 579, Seffner. Donald Roberts and Robert Fischer will speak about the Coastal Conservation Association. The meeting is free and open to the public. Call (813) 317-5497.

Monica Brandies can be reached at monicabrandies@yahoo.com.

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