The best flowers to add to a vegetable garden

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Q. As I add plantings to my vegetable plots, a question has arisen: What annual flowers are considered most appropriate for planting in food gardens?

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A. Flowers add colour and interest to vegetable plots and, chosen carefully, they attract and nurture beneficial insects that pollinate our food plants and help to control the insect pests that damage them.

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Many of the best flowers to feed beneficial insects self-sow to maintain repeat appearances in the garden. Among these are sweet alyssum, calendula, borage (also called bee bush), cilantro and cosmos.

I seed cilantro in patches several times over the growing season, and let the plants self-sow for a constant supply of fresh greens, flowers, and seeds to set up the next wave of fresh growth. In bloom, the plants become alive with the movement of hover flies, whose larvae are voracious aphid predators.

Hover flies are usually the first beneficial insects to appear in the spring. The more food the adult flies have, in the form of pollen and nectar, the more eggs they lay. The eggs hatch into the larvae that prey on insect pests.

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Simple, single daisy type flowers like most shasta daisies, marguerite daisies sunflowers and calendulas give the easiest possible access to the food all sorts of beneficial insects need to flourish and multiply.

Calendulas both self-sow and act as perennials in some gardens. Their cheery flowers brighten a food garden, and the yellow that predominates in the blooms is a powerful attractant for most beneficial insects.

I’m fond of nasturtiums as another brightly coloured flower in food gardens. The blooms’ nectar is exceptionally sweet, attracting hummingbirds and other pollinators. Nasturtiums come in compact, trailing, and vining types. The compact ones are most suitable for edging. I often use alyssum, calendula and nasturtium to edge vegetable plots.

As well as along plot edges, patches of flowers can also be fit in easily in corner spaces and other “free” areas that crop up between vegetable plantings.

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