Top 5 Interplantings this Summer

So many beautiful views this time of summer in the garden, and here are my top five plantings I’ve created this year so far, and why I love them.

You can’t plan these things. When I plant my snapdragons, they are from a Tetra blend, which means I’m picking from a lottery of colors. This planting, though, of my goodness. It is perfect in every way, and the colors all talk to each other. It’s harmonious and the eggplant foliage, albeit riddled with holes from grasshopper damage, really anchors the flowers that have grown to envelope it. The calendula is all Zeolights, though as you can see there is some major variation in color of those flowers. Again, I used Rosie O Day sweet alyssum in this planting too (and it’s all along the main path as well).

I always stuff my pickling cucumbers with flowers. Calendula and cosmos are two standard interplantings, and dill has become a third favorite. They end up supporting each other, and the prolific cucumbers have never seemed to been negatively impacted by the tight quarters. Highly recommend trellising your cucumbers and dotting the planting with flowers.

I didn’t expect to love this triangle bed quite as much as I am, but here we are. The thing that has surprised and delighted me is just how completely full it has become in the past three weeks. The beans are bumping right up to the corn on one side and the alyssum or onions on the other side. It’s like a stuffed serving of beautiful. The beans are climbing a little, which is somewhat unusual since I’ve been growing these from saved seed since 2019. Dapple Gray beans are a bush type. Only some of the plants seem to be wanting to run, so I’m letting them reach for the skies. I won’t do anything but let this bed ride out the season.

I tried so hard with this bed, and it’s not a total disappointment, but there’s room for improvement. This is my sesame bed, and I wanted it to be a white-pink-purple bed. And I achieved that. It is planted with QISO Purple gomphrena, Rosie O Day sweet alyssum, thai basil, Purple Red and Silvery White strawflower, Redbor kale, and Black and Tan sesame.

I could have had a few more sesame plants, and some of my strawflower aren’t doing as well as i’d liked. I purposely left zinnia out of this bed because of their form and texture. I wanted the pop to be spikes of sesame flowering in August. Since it’s not August yet, there’s still hope, though these plants seem to be flowering one at a time along the stem and not in one large cluster like they did last summer. I’m a bit puzzled but there’s lots of summer left and this bed may slide into its utter glory I had intended it to be.

he final bed I love the most is the patio bed. I’ve always loved this bed and stuffed it with Benary’s giant zinnia. This year I went for zinnia, kale, and Alpha calendula. The calendula are out of this world vibrant and this entire bed has an ethereal feel. It’s my very favorite interplanting in the garden this summer. The only regret is I could have fit a few more plants in this bed … maybe some sweet alyssum in the understory to completely fill it out — and I should have added a few more zinnia too as the calendula are about to take a midsummer siesta before raging back to life in early fall. Noted for next year!