If I didn’t use companion planting, I wouldn’t be able to grow such a wide array of vegetables, fruits, and herbs.In addition, monocropping or filling an area with groups of the same vegetable serves as an open invitation to that plant’s most common pests to come hither and feast.Plus, gardening legend has it that all the different colors – a sea of lavender, marigold, and nasturtium, for example – can serve to confuse potential pests.Trailing pumpkin vines, with their large leaves, can act as a living mulch for crops with an upright growth habit, and help to keep their roots cool, and the soil moist.Pumpkins are heavy feeders, and legumes such as beans and peas “fix” nitrogen, or add more of this essential plant nutrient to the soil.These tasty summer annuals require companions who favor similar growing conditions.Squash thrives in USDA Hardiness Zones 3-10 as long as you keep plants warm in cold weather, and provide some protection from excessive heat.Early Native American peoples – including the Muscogee (Creek), Maya, and Haudenosaunee – planted these crops together to take advantage of their mutual benefits.The corn, in turn, provides a trellis for your pole beans, which will also fix nitrogen in the soil.Korean licorice mint, Agastache rugosa, attracts several types of beneficial hoverflies.The hoverflies will lay their eggs on the leaves, and the larvae that hatch out love to feed on aphids, mealybugs, mites, and other pumpkin pests.That’s the benefit lavender provides for pumpkins: it helps attract bees, which are an important pollinator for these plants.Find your own ‘Hidcote Promise Compact’ lavender seeds to plant with your gourds at Eden Brothers.Marigolds may repel root-knot nematodes, harmful soil-borne pests that can damage your pumpkin crops, as their roots secrete bioactive chemicals that suppress roundworms.You can plant them as a cover crop, and till them into your garden at the end of the season to help improve the soil and keep it nematode-free.Not to be confused with its close cousin, oregano, marjoram tastes sweeter, with a lightly spicy, floral scent.Growing this in your garden means you can enjoy a bevy of tasty dishes, like this fresh tomato, egg, and goat-cheese tart from our sister site, Foodal.Garden legend has it that marjoram can improve the flavor of many veggies, pumpkins included, if the sweet herb is planted among the vines.According to Louise Riotte, author of “Carrots Love Tomatoes,” available on Amazon, colorful nasturtiums help keep squash bug infestations down.Besides, you can toss peppery nasturtium flowers and leaves in a salad or simply enjoy the feast of color in your garden.The plant also attracts the beneficial insects – such as ladybugs – that feed on common cucurbit pests, like cucumber beetles, aphids, and whiteflies.Plant compact nasturtiums in the middle of your patch, like the ‘Dwarf Apricot,’ available from Eden Brothers.They benefit from the living mulch provided by squash vines and the trellis of a cornstalk, but they also add nitrogen to the soil.Since pumpkins need nitrogen and Sister Corn absolutely guzzles it out of the soil, growing beans is helpful for next year’s crop.Any legume can perform this beneficial task, but pole beans are ideal for the Three Sisters grouping because they climb up corn stalks, and save space in the garden.Often referred to as the Fourth Sister, sunflowers can attract pollinators to the pumpkin patch and help distract birds away from juicy corn kernels in a companion plant grouping.Next year, I’m going to try my hand at growing a Four Sisters garden with pole beans, corn, pumpkins, and sunflowers.They may also cross-pollinate with other cucurbits, which can be an issue if you’re trying to save seeds from your gourds to replant specific cultivars next season
