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More on Companion Plants

Chamomile instead of Herbicide and Pesticide: German farmers have discovered the reason why so-called weeds make a grainfield healthy and productive.

Don't Fight the Dandelions, Enjoy Them: The maligned dandelion is a great companion plant to grass.

Louise Riotte Books

More Companion Planting
Books at Amazon

Companion Plants

by Traute Klein, biogardener

Companion plants protect and promote each other.

Just as some people work well together, so some plants help each other. They protect each other from disease and pests, and they promote growth in each other. Some articles on examples of plant companions are linked in the left hand column.

Companion Plants in Nature

Mother Nature practices companion planting. I have never seen a herb garden in nature. In my hikes in Europe and North America, I have only come across one individual herb in one place where it was surrounded by or scattered among other plants whom it protected from pests and diseases. So why are we gardeners carefully assembling all herbs into one place which we call a herb garden? If we scattered those herbs among all the other plants, we would not have to worry about garden pests or diseases.

Companion Plant Guru

The original companion planting books were written by Louise Riotte. All other books which I have seen have borrowed from her heavily, some of them without giving her credit. I came across her book, "Carrots Love Tomatoes" during my first year of solo gardening. It became my organic gardening Bible and allowed me to avoid all the pitfalls into which new gardeners tend to fall. It gave me the tools to establish a totally chemical-free garden without having to worry about pests or diseases.

Carrots Love Tomatoes

Secrets of Companion Planting for Successful Gardening
On August 1, 1998, the following customer comment was entered on the Amazon Books site for Louise Riotte's most popular book:
Gardening Bible: This book has revolutionized my gardening methods. Within a year of buying it 15 years ago, my garden became healthy and productive. Riotte has taught me how to match plants which are able to protect each other from pests and diseases without the use of sprays, either chemical or organic. Her methods have built an invisible wall around my garden which keeps pests confined to my neighbors' yards without crossing into mine.

Had I never read another gardening book or watched any gardening show, this book alone would have made me a successful organic gardener. I highly recommend it to beginning or advanced organic gardeners alike.

I am the reader who submitted that comment, and I still stand by my 1998 comments.

This book reveals the author as a resourceful gardener with a warm personable style which endears her to her readers. The many editions of her book have been going out of print as fast as they have appeared on the market. I have bought many copies of this book in secondhand stores in Winnipeg to give to other gardeners.

Many companion planting books are not specific in matching plants which are beneficial to each other, and I consider them useless. Riotte also lists plants which harm each other and should be kept apart.

If you want a healthy garden without the use of unnatural methods, this book is for you. You can order it from Amazon from the box in the left column.

Examples of Companion Plants in My Garden

1. Onions and garlic, if surrounding fruit trees and shrubs year-round, keep aphids away.
   
2. Chamomile in a grain field elimates pests and promotes high yield.
   
3. Radishes, surrounding a patch of corn, eliminate corn borers. Stick in one seed every 12 inches and let the plants go to seed.
   
4. Green beans here and there in a potato patch eliminate potato beetles.
   
5. Herbs keep flying insects away. Plant bitter herbs in the middle of a cabbage patch to prevent cabbage butterflies from lighting on plants, laying the eggs which breed the worms.
   
6. Patches of chives beside lilac and elder eliminate borers.
   

© Traute Klein, biogardener