I keep saying I’m not very good at growing flowers, vegetables and now fruit seems to be my thing. However in the vegetables garden this summer, there seems to be flowers everywhere.

Marigolds

These orange and red coloured flowers have been a hit with hoverflies, resting places for honey bees and bumble bees and other flying insects. Most importantly they were only planted in the vegetable garden to keep away pests like aphids – greenfly, whitefly and blackfly.

Coriander – gone to flower

I have grown some herbs this year notably coriander because we eat a lot of it in curries. It almost always goes to flower and bolts in the heat. But every year I leave it in the vegetable beds for the hover-flies and other flying insects to enjoy. It’s dainty clusters of white flowers adds a floaty feel to the vegetable beds as it sits above the lettuces.

Borage

I’ve grown this for the first time this year because of companion planting, I’ve read it was good for growing with strawberries. I’m also a fan of anything with blue flowers because it is so different to what you normally see. Borage is supposed to help by bringing in defender insects to any attack any pests that are attracted by your strawberries. Apparently the flavour of the strawberries are enhanced too just by growing borage near them. Also borage = bees.

Sunflowers

It has been the best year for sunflowers ever, our line of giant sunflowers are well over 7 ft high and are still flowering in clusters with small heads. They are bee and wasp magnets.

The advantage of growing sunflowers is harvesting your own sunflower seeds when they go over. These can either be used as seeds in cereals, cakes, bread etc or used to feed the birds in the winter in your garden. Our resident squirrel has already taken a liking to some of the flower heads by picking off the seeds himself, why not, have a snack on the go!

Vegetable flowers

Of course there’s also a lot of vegetables that produce their own flowers which need pollinating so you can harvest your vegetables. Here’s a few flowers on vegetables to note at this time of the year in August:

• Mange tout – purple flowers
• French beans – white and pink flowers,
• Tomato – yellow flowers
• Strawberries – white flowers

Other posts on Companion Planting

• The Marigolds Ring of Steel for Tomatoes
• Update on the Marigolds Ring of Steel
• Space saving in the Vegetable Garden – Intercropping
• Pesky Pests in the Vegetable Garden – Aphids