It will compete, by definition, but that doesn’t mean that it will be harmful in a practical sense. For example, it’s not hard to imagine that what cost the clover incurs, it pays for it with nitrogen fixing and preventing evaporation. With clover, it stays low so if it’s inconvenient to mow, you can actually just stomp it a few times.
My personal way of companion plant is what I call natural remedies for personal flaws. For example, I tend to over water and fertilize, and I can’t (or am unwilling) to control where my digs eliminate, so to prevent my trees from growing vigorously every year, I have them densely planted with bulb lilies, willows, and other hungry feeders. They are there to prevent the dogs from chasing rabbits right under the first row and breaking branches.
i would also like to add that interplanting may be a better term than companion planting which alows you to make the most of your time and space, for example garlic can be planted in sept and crimson clover seed put ontop of it which will prevent weeds and provide a hay barrier in summer, also growing raspberries in spots that get half day sun will allow you to get the most of your space without sacrificing sun loving plants time and space
In my 8’x3’x 30" deep garden box, I planted Yukon gold potatoes, then broad beans on top. The beans grow fast and tall so they are above the potato plants and both are highly productive in the same area of the garden box. I keep my plants well fed and well watered so the garden box is extremely productive with cauliflower, broccoli, broccolini, Swiss Chard and some snow peas as well. I plant my legumes in different sections each year to help add nitrogen to the soil for next year’s plantings.
I call what I do “intensive urban gardening”, rather than companion planting. Serves much the same purpose, such as crowding out weeds, nitrogen fixing, maximizing use of the available space.
I tend to think of companion planting as two or more kinds of of plants planted together to help each other out, and interplanting as two or more kinds of plants planted together that don’t get in each other’s way. Same thing, different reasons.
o yes nettle hay is very good for neighboring plants esp trees. also it has been porpotedly used to increase the volatile oils of many other plants, is also edible good for blood and used to make natural green dye
When you said it was a companion plant, I got the impression that it was alive and growing (and stinging), not the ‘hay’ or dried version.
Um, yeah, don’t see this as an option in my garden - at least on purpose.
i think the roots feed neighboring plants when they regenerate but many have problems with the stinging part, which i do not object to, but is healed by another wild edible burdock, i have no experience with this as i do not mind getting stung, but have heard burdock is edible
I’ve been stung by stinging nettle - not pleasant, esp for children (i.e grandkids). Burdock is a welcome plant but has a very deep narrow taproot - too much for me to dig up. Neither of these make gardening fun.
On the other hand I plan to use some hyssop this year and put artemisia between the stone fruit trees. Easy and asthetically pleasing…and fun…and easy.
I apparently don’t react to nettles, which I bizarre cause I react strongly to everything else. Mosquitoes just look at me and l itch, but not nettles!
I discovered this when trying to learn to identify them. I walked into the middle of a patch (with shorts on) and decided they matched the description, but must be nettles since they didn’t sting. Then my husband walked over and started cursing!
The internet seems be believe Goumi will increase an orchards yield 10% when intercropped. I never found the study but I did find one USDA document making the claim. It was however a related species American Silverberry. Little facts like that did not stop me from planting a goumi near my apple and pear trees. I also planted this year comfrey, for the usual reasons, nutrient extraction from deep underground and root prompting hormones. The last two years I have also planted peanuts, Bambara groundnut, and peas just to watch them grow. Next year I will actualy plant them early enough to produce.
One argument against nitrogen fixers is they dont really provide nitrogen to adjacent plants. It may be true you dont get 100% of the nitrogen unless you kill the nitrogen fixer, but usually plants steal 10%. I would be plenty happy with a perpetual 10%.
One soil improver I suggest you stay away from is Jerusalem artichoke. JA’s increase the microbial life in soil. Which is more important for overall plant health then nitrogen fixing and doses of fertilizer. The problem is once established there is no getting rid of them. Way more then you can eat and you never find them all. I grow mine in planting fabric planting bags, and I reused the bags and soil for my apple trees. Now I have 10 ft tall JA’s hiding the apple trees. Fortunately the bags are not the apple trees final home. The Sunflower family, which JA’s are part of, store there carbohydrates as inulin. Bacteria love inulin and will multiply. The left over soil should see the benefits next year after the JA’s feeder roots decompose. Annual sunflowers might be a good choice as you dont have to worry about regrowth, but be sure to let the sunflower stalk dry before removal to let the roots pull all the energy back in.
I have a plant called fragrant bedstraw (gallium triflorum) that grows abundantly in my orchard. I have come to like it because it creates a thick vinious mat of living vegetation. I have 6’ diameter wire cages around my trees that I keep mulched with peastone near the trunk and wood chips / spoiled hay beyond . The fragrant bedstraw spills in from outside the cages and adds a thick layer of weed suppressing living mulch. I spend very little time weeding.
Two autumns ago, I planted a strip of winter rye adjacent to a my newly constructed gravel road for erosion control. Last spring, I got behind and didn’t mow the rye, which then went to seed. All summer huge flocks of birds would fly back and forth between the rye patch and orchard eating any moth or caterpillar in sight. I had no caterpillar damage last year (unlike my neighbor who was hit hard, and unlike my orchard this year which has had localized outbreaks). Rye groat + worm = perfectly balanced diet apparently.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galium_triflorum:
“The plant is considered a noxious weed in New York, Pennsylvania, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut and Massachusetts.”
“The entire vine does not feel very coarse, but it is rough enough to stick to clothing.”
From Syracuse university:
“Unlike many other states, New York has never had a noxious weed list. That is about to change. Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo signed a bill July 24 that gives the Department of Environmental Conservation and the Department of Agriculture and Markets the authority to regulate the sale, purchase, possession, introduction, importation and transport of invasive species, including plants, animals and other organisms such as bacteria or viruses. A list of the species that will be prohibited or regulated will be developed by the departments and put into effect by Sept. 1, 2013.”
The list:
I may have missed it but fragrant bedstraw is not on the list. In any event, it is ubiquitous in my area.
The list that you linked is called “Prohibited and Regulated Invasive Species”. If a plant is native (as Galium triflorum is) it wouldn’t be on that list. But it’s still a weed.
