Companion planting is the term for what all cottage gardens have done for centuries, intermixing the crops to enhance production in some way or another. There are many ways that the intermixing of plants can assist the farmers. To find the best combinations requires a fair bit of experience and knowledge with and about plants and farming.  There are books and other research on this topic but it is not complete and I am interested in researching both known mixes under my growing conditions and treatment and new mixes.

Each plant can interact in many different ways with different combinations of plants; some of these interactions are desirable and some are not. Some of the many desirable effects are, increased yield per area(ie. kale and Fava Beans, since the plants can be planted closer than if just one kind was planted), increased aromatic oils (ie. if nettles   are planted with mint/herbs the aromatic content will increase significantly), weed suppression (ie. squash with corn), living mulch (ie. squash and corn) etc. It is best if the combination is good for both (or all) plants involved, but sometimes it will work out to do a mix that is good for one and indifferent or even bad for the other.

With companion planting and good soil, you can have a highly efficient garden with high yields and low pest damage, all without using noxiously toxic pesticides and herbicides. Also, mixing crops provides better security than one crop, so if a storm kills all the beans but doesn't kill the sunchokes, then at least there was only a partial loss rather than a total loss.


Companion Planting Scale:  Of course, most companion plantings will not fit any of these ranks exactly but they are a helpful guide.

Ranking	Description
Bad (1)	One (or more) plants with noticeable detriments and no noticeable benefit to any of the others.
Poor (2)	No noticeable effect to any of the companion plants
Acceptable (3)	One (or more) plants with noticeable benefits and one (or more) plants with detriment
Good (4)	One (or more) plants with noticeable benefits and no more than one plant with no noticeable benefit
Great (5)	All plants with noticeable benefits