Friday 3 July 2015

Basic Companion Planting

There is a lot of information about companion planting, with whole books being dedicated to the subject.
As I am in the planning stages of the garden, I have been looking for some lists on the internet. 






Here are some of the links that were helpful:

Sustainable Gardening Australia - great as it also has a discussion first and includes plants that are bad neighbours as well as good. For example, I did not know that parsley and lettuce are bad neighbours.

The Permaculture Research Institute - this is a PDF, so you can print it. Maybe even laminate to keep in the gardening shed.

Mother Earth News - article on companion planting.

Green Life Soil - and that silverbeet loves lavender.

Heirloom Organics - this includes a companion planting garden map/layout and an explanation of the Three Sisters planting. I am planning on trying a Three Sisters planting this year.

Small Farm Permaculture and Sustainable Living - this contains a few planting guides, including one for fruit trees. There are lots of useful articles at this site - well worth a browse. 

Urban Allotments - this list contains quite a few plants not on other lists, such as aniseed. And comfrey is a great slug trap.

Borage
Chives



French marigold
Nasturtium
Sunflower

And let's face it, it will make your garden look SO pretty!! Do you plan your garden using companion planting principles? Have you found any pairings that are particularly beneficial?

4 comments:

  1. Parsley bad for lettuce? I've got a huge clump of parsley in the middle of the garden bed I've been growing lettuce in and they've gone great guns. But It's the first time I've grown lettuce so maybe I'm mistaken. I wish I had more room to companion plant but with space very limited I think the odd basil bush in amongst the tomatoes will be the limit.

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    1. I had never heard this before and was also surprised. I have never had trouble with this combination as I just put parsley all over the place. Maybe it is just sometimes?!

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  2. Maybe it is only certain varieties of lettuce that don't play well with parsley. Isn't fun to plan for upcoming gardens! We are in mid summer here now in the Midwest US. We have had so much rain for several weeks now that I wish I would have planned for swamp gardens of some type. My plants that were so pretty before these rains started are starting to look bad. Roses that were always fine in years past are developing black spot. Luckily, my herbs that are planted in big pots are doing fine...so far.

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    1. That is what I was thinking - the article didn't go into detail.
      We are always looking for rain in Australia, but it is a shame that you have too much! Hope the plants all recover.

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