[Bert]

Dose anyone do the companion planting thing? I will be trying it for the first time this year. It's quite exciting  . I keep referring back to my book. I've learnt that parsnips don't like growing next to carrots but they like peas, potatoes & peppers.
pumpkins don't like potatoes but they do like sweet corn. I will end up copying out the whole book if I carry on. So I will stop 
 Is it just me that finds this interesting. Or is this just common sense to all you more experienced veg gardeners out there .     

[Fleecewife]

I'm glad you mentioned it Bert, before I put parsnips next to my carrots, which is what I was about to do     Is the reasoning that they share pests, or that they dislike each other for a different reason?

I don't practice companion planting beyond growing tagetes with my tomatoes and nasturtium in the tunnel, both to deter insects - don't know if it works but they're there now and come back every year on their own.  (I also grow scented nicotiana in the tunnel for its glorious smell even though it seems to attract greenfly) so that's a companion for the gardener 

One I have heard of is to grow carrots amongst onions or garlic, to confuse carrot root fly - I don't think the little devils would be so easily put off 

I'm looking forward to hearing the results of your trials 

[Bramblecot]

Hi Bert and FW
I try and do companion planting on a small scale - tagetes, marigolds and nasturtiums mixed with veg. 
I often under plant the sweet corn with pumpkins - that is traditional in USA I believe, they have similar growing conditions and the corn is cleared when the pumpkins need to ripen.
I've read about the carrot and onion  but never got round to growing carrots as our soil is heavy clay.
I am trying to keep scented herbs with 'hard' foliage eg rosemary, hyssop, sage mixed with the trays of seedlings in in the greenhouse in an effort to deter slugs.  I'll let you know if it works

[Somewhere_by_the_river]

We were given some ornamental gourds a couple of years ago, they needed to be able to climb so the only place I could put them was with the climbing French and runner beans. I had to remove some of the leaves periodically to stop them becoming too big and heavy and found the smell of them when I did rather strong - so did the deer, apparently, as despite doing a raid on the local salad bar (us!) on a regular basis they didn't touch the beans for once! Box is another good one to deter deer, the smell is supposed to confuse them and they certainly left the roses alone after I planted some with them.

The only other things I've really tried is tagetes with the beans as a black and greenfly deterrent, which seems to work to some extent, and nasturtiums as a 'sacrificial' crop. Can't really comment on whether the onions next to carrots/parsnips works to deter root fly as we've never had a problem, though I've always planted them like that. I like the theory, not least if it involves growing decorative with productive - why not make it pretty too, even if it only works to attract other insects to get rid of the nastys. I've grown pumpkins beneath sweetcorn before, but mostly to suppress the weeds and make best use of space rather than as companions.

We're growing in our new patch for the first year, having moved too late to do anything other than over winter onions last year (the garden was more of a field!). I have great plans (as always) for a productive patch that looks good as well as feeds us and I'll certainly look forward to hearing which of your experiments work well Bert so please do keep us up to date on what you try and what seems to work. I was raking out a new bed yesterday, though I'm not sure how efficient a worker I was proving - I seemed to spend half my time feeding leatherjackets to the chickens... I guess that's companion planting of a sort...!?! 

[Lesley Silvester]

I tried growing carrots with onions one year but the carrots did so badly that the carrot fly, if they came, would have felt sorry for us. 

[Somewhere_by_the_river]

Truth be told, the only year carrots did germinate in our garden OH decided to do a bit of weeding...  After that I only grew them in a large trough type planter well away from harm (and higher than carrot root fly are said to fly)! This was at the 'old' place, no idea why but carrots sown direct in the ground were a problem, though parsnips, which are supposed to be more difficult, always did great.

[Bert]

I am doing the companion planting with the carrots, onions & garlic but they are all in separate fish boxes next to each other in the tunnel. So I don't really think I will notice if it works or not . I'm also planting cabbage, sage & dill together apparently the cabbage white butterfly doesn't like them  .
 Here is a link to the book that started all this


http://www.amazon.co.uk/Companion-Planting-Brenda-Little/dp/1847733344/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1398186057&sr=8-1&keywords=Companion+planting


I've just had to look up tagetes  . Now I've seen pictures I know what you are on about.

[Somewhere_by_the_river]

  Oops, sorry, the rest of the family's always telling me off for not using names they recognise too! (Of course, it doesn't help that I grow English, French and African marigolds and they are not really gardeners!)

You've done it now, can't resist a good book  Interesting thought, cabbage with sage... Might give that a go! (OH won't be happy - it means buying more books and plants... Is there any greater felicity...?!  )

MGoM - at least it worked, in a way... 

[Mammyshaz]

I try to be good with companion planting with corn & pumpkins, nasturtiums, poached egg plants and , and the onion, garlic and carrots. The last set doesn't work, or at least didn't here. I did it a good few years in a row and the carrot root fly decimated the lot each time despite spring onions between carrots and alternating carrot , onion and garlic rows 

Oh chucks! Didn't know about the parsnip and carrots. Guess what went in side by side this weekend 

Haven't planted any for a couple of years after such disasters but trying again this year. Just using the woven coverings this time. 

[Fleecewife]

The other thing I do is summer savory with broad beans.  You have to start the savory way before the beans, or they aren't ready together.  The big plus is that the summer savory then makes a great addition to white sauce to accompany the beans.   I've forgotten why they like eachother in the garden - maybe to do with black fly?

[Bert]

I like the Summer savory idea. For the second year running my summer savory hasn't germinated . The broad bean aren't  going to suffer because I don't grow them. I don't grow what I don't eat. I do feel I'm missing out not growing them
The book says ( so it must be true ) broad beans grow well with carrots, cucumber, cabbage, lettuce, peas, parsley and cauliflower. They grow badly if near onions, garlic, fennel and gladioli .

I'm glad you mentioned it Bert, before I put parsnips next to my carrots, which is what I was about to do     Is the reasoning that they share pests, or that they dislike each other for a different reason?

Parsnips dislikes are carrot, celery & caraway. They like peas, potatoes & peppers. They won't fall out with beans, radish or garlic.
No reason given as to why they do & don't get on with each other.
I've grown parsnips and carrots next to each other before. I don't think either of them did well. I put it down to me being a bad gardener

[Dans]

I'm giving it a go this year. I'm trying some carrots and garlic at either end of the same bed and in the middle they are alternating so will see if that works. Only other time I grew carrots they were riddled with carrotfly. Have another bed where the carrots and onions are all alternating. Although 2 weeks on and no signs of carrot growth so not sure how well this experiment will work. I am on heavy stony soil though, not ideal, but the seeds were free so figured why not.

Tempted to try the pumpkin and sweetcorn. Digging out a new bed at the moment which will get some fresh compost at the bottom, just don't know if we are too cold (Midlothian) for sweetcorn and pumpkin to grow without cover.

Bad people tempting me with books. Might have to smile sweetly at the hubby. Maybe a reward for the next chapter I finish writing?

Dans

[Ryder]

I planted cabbages and nasturtiums together, all mixed in the same area.  Completely forgot to check if they go well together or not (don't ask, had a hectic few days, and had to do a rushed job if i wanted anything planted at all).  This thread just reminded me I have that book too Bert.  So I go check under cabbages, and nothing about nasturtiums.  But under nasturtiums though I was happy  to  find "nasturtiums secrete a mustard oil which insects find attractive, and they will seek them out in preference to cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, brussel sprouts, kholrabi and turnips growing nearby....let them (the nasturtiums) wander between these crops"

[Ina]

I always start out with good intentions - proper rotation, companion planting etc - and it always ends up as "oh look, there's a bit of space, and I've got all these seedlings to go in somewhere..."

I do try to have marigold in lots of places, though. They tend to come up all over the garden.

[Somewhere_by_the_river]

I know what you mean Ina, I suspect this year for us it'll be more a case of we've dug and raked the bed, this lot of seedlings is ready so in it goes! ...Not much of a garden when we moved in and thanks to the lovely wet winter we didn't get to do the groundwork we'd planned to do finished before the growing season. We also had a lot of old seed packets that moved with us (some already opened, but I couldn't bear to chuck them out) that we figured we'd give a go anyway... so this year I think our companion planting will actually consist of courgettes with everything!!