Growing Vegetables

While it may seem to you that bugs are crawling over everything in your garden, you may notice that a few plants aren’t having any trouble at all. Garlic, marigolds, and mints are known for their built-in repulsiveness to bugs, and many other plants have this beneficial trait, also repellant plants will bestow some protection on nearby crops, up to a distance of about three feet. While some turn off a whole variety of insects, others are effective against a particular pest: garlic is offensive to most insects you’ll come across.

Pests	Repellant Plants
Ants	Spearmint , Southernwood
Aphids	Spearmint , Southernwood , garlic , chives
Asparagus Beetle	Tomato
Borer	Garlic , Tansy
Cabbage Maggot	Mint , Tomato , Rosemary
Cabbage Moth	Mint , Rosemary , Southernwood , Thyme , Sage
Carrot Fly	Rosemary , Sage , Black salsify
Chinch Bug	Soybeans
Colorado Potato Beetle	green beans , horseradish
Cucumber Beetle	radish
Cut Worm	Tansy
Flea Beetle	Wormwood , Mint
Gopher	Castor Bean
Japanese Beetle	Garlic , Geranium
Leafhopper	Petunia , Geranium
Mexican Bean Beetle	Marigold , Potato , rosemary , petunia
Mice	Mint
Mites	Onion , Garlic
Mole	Castor Beans , Squill
Nematode	Marigold , Asparagus
Rabbit	Allium Family
Slug	Wormwood
Squash Bug	Tansy
Pumpkin Beetle	Nasturtium
Tomato Hornworm	Borage , Marigold
White Fly	Marigold ,
Wire Worm	White Mustard

Chives, garlic, leeks, shallots, and alliums poses a strong aromatic power and this is not lost on the insect world. Garlic is the mightiest of these, and is probably the most widely used living repellent, It helps out no matter where in the garden you plant it, and does so without taking up a lot of valuable space. A fringe benefit you’ll discover is that garden-grown garlic has a much better-mannered taste than the cloves that you can buy in stores. Garlic also does the job in the berry patch, grape arbor, and around fruit trees, It will not tamper with delicate fruit flavors.

Why are companion plantings healthier? Perhaps because the plants make complementary demands on the environment. For instance, the compatibility of celery and leek can be seen with the upright-growing leek enjoying the room and light near the bushy celery plant. Or, the roots of two friendly plants may occupy different strata of the soil, like Swiss chard and beans. Lettuce and kohlrabi get along well because the lettuce is harvested about the time the kohlrabi comes to need all the space in the row.

Unbeknown to the casual observer, the root exudates of a plant can affect the well being of its neighbors. Marigolds put off a substance that keeps nematodes at bay, and inter-planting the flower with susceptible crops will show positive results over a year or two. Mustard oil released from the roots of mustard family members will sweeten an acid soil, helping out adjacent plants that suffer when the pH is too low The secretions also inhibit the hatching of potato nematode cysts. The roots of both oats and flax excrete compounds that inhibit the growth of some harmful soil fungi, Many deep-rooted plants, including certain weeds, have the ability to bring towards the surface many essential minerals, making them available to their neighbors. This is important to plant protection because plants with deficiencies are especially prone to disease and insect feeding. Asso­ciations like these can strengthen the vegetables, giving you better taste, better nutrition, and less insect damage.

When planting a companion garden, it’s good to get the companions right in there together, one way is to plant zig-zag rows, with the zigs and zags of the beets and onions tucked into one another. Another method is to use the techniques of intercropping, and plant several companions in the same row. Plant herbs in borders, and scattered throughout your garden.