Flowers Make Vegetable Gardening So Much Easier

Listen, I can buy myself flowers, and when I do, I put them in my vegetable garden. Not in my ornamental garden, but in my edible garden.

Flowers can make vegetable gardening so much easier, much more beautiful, more productive, and even more fun. They attract tons of beneficial insects and can even repel garden pests. Reason enough for me to consider flowers an essential part of any raised-bed kitchen garden.

I like to mix flowers and herbs around the border of every raised bed, and I've found certain flowers to be raised-bed rockstars over the years. So I have a pretty short flower list that I pull from, and I'm about to give you my cheatsheet.

Before I do, a quick head's up that these are annual flowers that will need to be changed based on the growing season (cool, warm, or hot). I teach you how to understand your gardening seasons no matter where you live in my book, Kitchen Garden Revival.

Let's start with the best flowers to grow with your vegetables in the cool season.

The Best Cool Season Flowers to Grow in a Vegetable Garden

The cool season is when the average high temperatures are between 35°F (1.7°C) and 64°F (17.8°C) and there's still a chance of frost. If you live in a cooler climate, your cool season will likely be in the spring and then again in the fall. In warmer climates, your cool season might run throughout the winter months.

Here in Nashville, these are the flowers I put in right at the start of the gardening season because they can hang in there through some snow and frost.

My favorite cool season flowers include pansies, violas, snapdragons, calendula, and tulips.

Pansies & Violas

Pansies and violas are amazingly frost resistant and add so much color after the dull winter months. These things will flower and flower and then flower some more. They fill out the edges of the raised beds nicely and look so beautiful.

Snapdragons

Snapdragons are my favorite flower to grow when it's cool outside. Snapdragons come in all different colors, and their compact shape makes them perfect for growing along the borders of raised beds. Some of my prettiest garden photos ever come from the cool season, when the snapdragons are blooming right next to my leafy greens. Plus, you've never seen such happy bees as the ones that are hiding in the middle of a snapdragon bloom.

You can grow snapdragons from seed, but I typically buy well-grown plant starts from my local nursery. Make sure to deadhead (or remove) spent flowers; the plants will bloom two or three more times before the end of the season.

Tulips

I love adding tulips to my vegetable garden because they're compact, beautiful, and one of the first flowers you get to see in early spring. I plant tulip bulbs along the edges of my raised beds in late fall. You can plant them as late as the middle of winter in a mild climate. Soon you'll have the most charming flowers next to your spring greens and herbs. It's a great way to welcome the spring and feed your pollinators as soon as the temperatures start to warm up.

Other bulbs you can tuck into your vegetable garden for the cool season include daffodils and hyacinths. Just know that their bloom time will be significantly shorter than something like snapdragons or pansies.

Calendula

Calendula is, hands down, one of my favorite flowers to grow in the vegetable garden. These pretty little flowers can be grown from seeds planted directly in the garden as soon as your soil is workable.

Calendula is what we call a trap crop, meaning it attracts pests like aphids and whiteflies to its leaves. That may sound like a bad thing, but those pests will be kept off your beautiful leafy greens. You can easily deal with the pests that are gathered on your calendula plants, which will be no worse for the wear.

Lastly, calendula is actually really good for you. It's long been used as a medicinal plant to treat skin conditions like burns and rashes. You can make your own salves and tinctures from your calendula flowers. You can also brew calendula tea, which is delicious.

The Best Warm Season Flowers to Grow in a Vegetable Garden

Now let's move on to flowers that thrive in the warm season The warm growing season is when your temps are 65°F (18.3°C) to 84°F (28.9°C) and there's no chance of frost. Flowers that like to grow in this season are not frost tolerant. Make sure to add them once all chance of frost has passed.

Marigolds

Marigolds are probably the most well-known flower for companion planting with vegetables—and for good reason. They repel nematodes, deter squash bugs, and attract tons of beneficial insects. In the gardening world, we call that a triple threat.

The way these pretty little flowers work toward organic pest control is by releasing a compound called pyrethum, which is basically nature's bug spray. Amazingly, this compound has no negative effect on "good bugs" like ladybugs and hoverflies. I love to grow marigolds right alongside fruiting plants like tomatoes, peppers, beans, and cucumbers. They also pair great with basil.

All marigolds are beneficial, but one study found that French marigolds were particularly useful in repelling pests that attack below ground. They also smell divine.

When planting marigolds, keep their anticipated size in mind. French marigolds and gem marigolds, with their short height and itty bitty flowers, are great for raised beds. Tall marigolds, like African marigolds, are great for planting in the ground. Marigolds are super easy to grow from seed, even if you're a beginner gardener.

Sunflowers

Sunflowers are one of the best flowers to attract bees, ladybugs, and butterflies. Their seeds are also an important food source for birds like the yellow finch, which I love welcoming into my garden. Also great, sunflowers have deep roots that will help loosen your soil and get it ready for the next season.

Make sure to grow a compact sunflower variety, like the teddy bear sunflower, in your raised beds. If you want to grow a larger variety, plant it right outside your raised beds to still get all the benefits.

Salvia

The next flower that I love to use in a raised bed is a salvia. I'm not talking about perennial salvias that grow into small bushes. I'm talking about purple or red salvias that are annual flowers. That means they finish their life cycle in one year and won't come back the next year, except from seeds they dropped.

I put these red and purple salvias all around the borders of my raised beds. They produce flower spikes that bees and butterflies absolutely love; plus, they add some interesting texture and deep colors to the garden.

Sweet Alyssum

These dainty little flowers attract pollinators and predatory insects like ladybugs and parasitic wasps. In one study, sweet alyssum proved most effective at controlling aphid populations out of all the different flowers studied. Their effect can cover up to 50 feet of garden space!

Nasturtiums

Oh my goodness, this plant is a stunner with its tropical-looking flowers that grow in all different colors, and guess what? You can actually eat the leaves, the flowers, the seeds, everything.

You can buy seeds for a vining variety (which can cascade over the side of your raised bed or grow up a trellis) or a bush variety of nasturtium. Nasturtiums grow really easily from seed planted directly in your garden and look so beautiful in your raised beds.

Here's the incredible thing. They're not just edible and so beautiful. Nasturtiums also help protect your veggies from pests. They're what we call a trap crop. That means they actually lure pests like aphids and squash bugs away from your kale, zucchini, and tomato plants. Just another way that flowers can help with the productivity of your garden.

Consider nasturtiums a must-grow flower in your kitchen garden.

Coreopsis

If you're looking for a low-maintenance flower that blooms non-stop, coreopsis is the one for you. Coreopsis attracts tons of beneficial insects like parasitic wasps and lace wings, so it's ideal to grow right alongside plants that have pest problems.

I like to grow coreopsis in the in-ground bed right next to my raised vegetable beds because they tend to grow pretty tall. Plant them as near to your veggies as possible to enjoy the benefits these pretty little flowers provide.

Cosmos

Cosmos are non-stop bloomers, and oh my goodness, these daisy-like flowers are covered in bees and butterflies. You can grow cosmos in all different colors—pinks, purples, reds, yellows, oranges. They make your vegetable garden shine in the middle of summer while also taking care of our pollinators.

I recommend growing cosmos outside of your raised beds. You can sprinkle seeds right alongside your vegetable garden so that all those bees and butterflies come for the flowers and stay for your fruit.

The Best Hot Season Flowers to Grow in a Vegetable Garden

Hot season flowers can hang on in summer heat, even when temps are well over 85°F (29.4°C). These flowers need to be planted once the threat of frost has passed in your area. They really don't even like getting cold at all.

Salvias, cosmos, coreopsis, marigolds, and sunflowers can push into high temps if they have plenty of time to get established before the weather turns extreme. In addition to them, you can also grow angelonia, zinnias, and petunias.

Angelonia

Man, this flower is a stunner. It produces gorgeous flowers in yellow, white, pink, and purple. I added angelonia to all my clients' gardens back in Houston to last over the super hot, humid summers. They'd go in around May and bloom all the way through October, I'm not exaggerating.

Angelonia makes for beautiful cut flowers. Cut off some stems to bring inside, and your plants will give you more flowers. The blooms are also great for bees and butterflies because they grow on long spikes like salvia.

You got to add these to your garden, as well. 

Zinnias

Zinnias are perhaps the easiest (and most beautiful) cut flower you can grow, and the best part is they can grow right alongside your vegetables. They come in tons of different color and petal options. Zinnias don't like frost, but they can hang on in temps over 100°F (37.8°C).

Make sure you're planting a more compact variety of zinnias in your raised beds, something like Thumbelina zinnias, because zinnias can grow really tall and wild.

Zinnias are great for organic pest control. Certain pests like Japanese beetles will go to zinnias instead of attacking your eggplant or tomatoes. They're also a huge attractor for pollinators like butterflies, bees, and even hummingbirds. More reason to plant them in any raised bed growing a fruiting plant to help make that plant even more productive.

You can grow zinnias from seed right in your raised beds and then save your own seeds for next year.

Petunias

Petunias might just look like pretty little flowers, but they are actually so good for the garden. Petunias repel aphids, squash bugs, and tomato hornworms. Their height makes them perfect for planting alongside the edges of your raised bed, and then their trailing habit adds so much beauty to your space. Petunias can be planted alongside pretty much any plant, including tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, beans, and even leafy greens.

Which Flowers Should Not Be Planted in a Raised Bed?

There are some groups of flowers that I wouldn't put in raised beds.

Perennial Flowers

Perennial flowers come back year after year. They might die back in winter, but as soon as the soil warms up in spring, they pop back up from their rootstock and often quickly double in size. Perennials are typically not as fussy about the soil as annual plants, so they really don't need the nutrient-rich, loose soil in your raised beds to grow. Even though I love perennials like echinacea and rudbeckia, I wouldn't put them in my raised beds because it would be a waste of prime real estate. I'll save that space for much needier plants.

Grow your perennial flowers in perennial beds around your raised-bed kitchen garden. Some of my favorite perennials are echinacea, bee balm, rudbeckia (AKA black-eyed Susans), anise hyssop, and salvias.

Native Flowers

Raised beds are for fussier plants that need special soil, special tending, and extra depth for root growth. Native plants don't need any special treatment. They're used to growing in your climate, right in your native topsoil (read: the dirt in your backyard).

Native flowers include things like bluebonnets, Texas sage, and milkweed. This also goes for native grasses. I love growing milkweed, but I would never put milkweed in my raised beds. These plants are perfect for an in-ground garden.

Super Big Flowers

I wouldn't grow a standard-size sunflower or a tall zinnia in a raised bed. The same goes for coreopsis and cosmos. I love how beautiful those flowers are and how easily they grow from seed, but they can grow too wild for raised beds. Some can reach 3 to 5 feet wide and 5 to 8 feet tall. Again, don't waste precious raised bed real estate on something that would be just as happy, maybe even happier, growing right in the dirt.

Plant Flowers with All Your Vegetables

This is my short list for flowers that go great with vegetables, but check out my friend's book, Vegetables Love Flowers, if you want to learn more about the different flowers that can improve your space.

Sources

Ehrlich

Science Direct

UCDavis

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