Flowers in the vegetable garden can reduce pest problems and improve biodiversity. Here are six of my favorite flowers to grow for healthy garden crops.
I love pollinators and pretty flowers, too, so many years ago I started growing flowers in all of my vegetable beds. I liked the way it looked, and I felt happy growing food for me and food for the bees and butterflies.
However, I didn’t anticipate the power of bringing habitat for beneficial insects right into the places where I needed them.
Ladybugs were devouring aphids on the calendula, while the kale and broccoli nearby were pest-free. Beneficial braconid wasps covered the sweet alyssum and patrolled nearby crop plants. I was instantly hooked on this practice of integration!
How do you select the best flowers for your vegetable garden? The key is to pick flowers that are rich in high-protein pollen and that provide sources of nectar throughout the year (known as insectary plants). Many highly-bred ornamental flowers fall short on these criteria so it’s important to choose flowers that are known to attract beneficial insects. Here is my guide to the best flowers for vegetable gardening, all of which I have used successfully in my own garden. To make the list they had to be easy to grow, attractive and have plenty of beneficial properties:
CALENDULA
These flowers taste a lot like saffron but without the high price tag. They are tangy, peppery, spicy and offer a golden hue to the dish that they are cooked in.
Plant calendula in your veggie garden to attract pollinators and other beneficial insects. The orange and yellow flowers provide nectar all season long to butterflies, hummingbirds, and bees.
NASTURTIUM
These long-lived, late summer buds are often pickled. Some people enjoy using them in place of capers as they are sweet, peppery and mildly pungent.
These pretty old-fashioned annual flowers not only add color and cheer to your garden but also do wonders protecting your tomato plants. The deter whiteflies, squash bugs, beetles, and aphids while keeping fungal disease at bay. Although they are annual, they often reseed making them an even more delightful addition.
ROSES
Believe it or not, roses contain more vitamin C than any other fruit or vegetable. Rugosa roses or other older varieties typically offer the most flavor. They are often used to make jam, syrup and tea, or used as a garnish.
As the bush gets large, it can also provide some shade for veggies that don’t love the heat like kale and chard, and they grow naturally near heat-loving veggies like tomatoes, squash, and cucumber plants.
COSMOS
Few flowers grow as easily and bloom as profusely as cosmos. And those blooms can be put to practical use in the vegetable garden, as they attract many helpful insects. For instance, if you want to draw in green lacewings, choose a white or bright orange variety, such as ‘Cosmic Orange’.
Green lacewings are voracious eaters, vacuuming up all sorts of soft-bodied insects, including aphids, scale, and thrips. Thus, they are considered a beneficial insect, and making them at home in your vegetable garden will help to prevent pest problems.
CILANTRO
It seems everyone has a strong opinion about the taste of this herb—either you love it or hate it.
Whether or not you enjoy eating cilantro, it can still be a useful herb in the garden. That’s because its strong scent will actually repel pests.
As a member of the carrot family, its roots reach deep into the soil, loosening as it goes (nature’s free tilling service!). Also as a member of the carrot family, the flower and lacy foliage attract a wide number of beneficial insects.
Cilantro/Coriander will grow to two feet tall. Although this is at the tall end of flowers for the vegetable garden, I find that its upright growth habit allows sunlight to get through to shorter crops around it.
CLOVER
Bees just love clover and honey bees use it to produce delicious clover honey. Red or crimson clover is a fantastic source of nitrogen for the soil too, widely used in organic farming.