Cooperative Living March/April 2018 - 17

sage leaves with tiny golden thyme and
bristling, vertical rosemary. Emphasize
variegated herbs: Sage, thyme, mint and
oregano all offer multicolored varietals.
Some of my favorites in the herb garden
are the delicately mapped leaves of redveined
sorrel, as well as deep plum-colored
basils such as " Purple Ruffles. "
In addition to aesthetic arguments, solid
gardening logic underlies the inter-planting
of edibles and ornamentals. For centuries,
gardeners have practiced companion
planting, mingling vegetables, herbs and
flowers to repel insects and enrich nutrients
without resorting to chemicals.
The allium family, including garlic, chives,
onions and ornamental alliums, protects other
vegetables and fruit trees against a wide
variety of insect pests. Tansy, loathed by
pests, sports compact feathery leaves and
button-sized yellow flowers that bloom in
late summer, when pollinators are running
out of options. It's an especially good
companion for berry canes and roses.
Nasturtiums and marigolds, visually and
gastronomically piquant in their own rights,
are top of the " bad " bugs' hate list too.
Flowers don't just repel harmful insects;
they lure beneficial ones. Choose flowers
that bloom simultaneously with the edibles
you want pollinated. Plants in the aster
family (including dandelions) and carrot
family (including dill, fennel, parsley and
coriander) appeal to useful parasitoids that
prey on maddening vegetable gobblers like
tomato hornworm.
Plants of varying heights perform from a
companion-planting perspective, in addition
to a visual one. Salad greens wilt and bolt in
summer sun, but plant them next to
tomatoes or peppers. By the time the weather
gets really hot, the fruiting plants will be tall
enough to shade the greens, while the greens
crowd out weeds under their protectors.
Ditto strawberries mingled with asparagus
in a perennial bed: Strawberries appreciate
the dappled shade from asparagus fronds,
and make weeding the bed much less work
for you. Throw in some dwarf marigolds
or borage for color and insect insurance,
and you have a three-season success.
By now, hopefully, you're convinced that
edibles deserve pride of place in your whole
garden, not just a few beds in the back. So
how do you go about incorporating them
among your ornamentals? If you're
contemplating new plantings, take
that opportunity.
Looking for a showstopper? Instead of a
rose to delight the Japanese beetles, try a
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No garden?
No problem ...
use a container!
Don't have a garden? Or have a garden, but
deer/groundhogs/the neighbor's dogs gobble
everything you plant? Or is your soil so terrible
you fear to plant in it?
You can grow thriving edibles in containers on a
protected deck, a driveway or even a sunny
windowsill. Container planting offers many
advantages, particularly the ability to control soil
quality and moisture. Insect pests and blights don't
migrate so easily among containers, while
portability allows you to extend the season.
Overwinter your tender herbs indoors every year,
or keep tender annuals alive longer by bringing
them in during fall cold snaps.
Container gardening doesn't work quite like
growing edibles in the ground, however. Follow
these tips for success:
1) High-quality potting soil is essential. Trust
me, I've tried cheap garden soil in
containers; I'll never do it again. Edible plants
are heavy feeders, so they need a generous
dose of compost and, ideally, some timerelease
fertilizer mixed into their soil. Once
you've bought the good stuff, you can reuse
it by adding compost and nutrients each year.
2) Keep it watered! Potted plants dry out much
more rapidly than those in the ground. In a
hot, dry summer, you might need to water
as much as twice a day. Make sure your
container has ample drainage and is near a
convenient water source.
3) Size matters. So does shape. Suit your
container to the plant: Shallow-rooted
spreaders like lettuce or strawberries prefer
wide pots, while deep-rooted types like
tomatoes demand depth. Really large
edible plants, like pumpkins or melons,
aren't realistic at all for containers.
4) Repurpose creatively. Glazed ceramic pots look
stunning, but they're heavy and expensive,
and the plants won't know the difference.
Think outside the box; you may have something
suitable already. With drainage holes drilled
in the bottom, a five-gallon paint bucket
makes a perfect tomato planter ... and the
handle's useful for toting it around! 
If you live near Winchester and want some TGIF fun
with hands-on container planting, come to the
Museum of the Shenandoah Valley's Make & Take
''Companion'' Containers Workshop, the evening of
Friday, April 27. You'll apply companion-planting
techniques to combine vegetables, herbs and
flowers, and bring the result home with you to
harvest all summer. Register at www.themsv.org.
Mesclun thrives even in small containers.
This spring grouping contains a patio blueberry
bush, bay laurel and key lime trees (overwintered
indoors), herbs and scented geraniums, and
" Little Marvel " peas under a tepee.
Here we have a perennial goji berry bush, a
patio tomato ( " Tidy Treats " ), and tender herbs
(pineapple sage and Vietnamese coriander)
overwintered inside and cut back hard to start
the growing season.
Kale seedlings in a hanging planter, ready to
be thinned.
March-April 2018 | Cooperative Living | 15
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Cooperative Living March/April 2018

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