Cannabis Companion Plants

What is a Companion Plant?

Companion planting is a neat way to enhance cannabis growth by leveraging natural interactions in the environment. These natural interactions include repelling harmful pests, attracting beneficial insects, and providing improvement to the soil in the garden.

Pest Control

Garlic

Garlic is a delicious addition to your growing garden, especially one with cannabis. Check out the benefits to adding these joyful bulbs:

• Contains natural insect repellant properties that target pests such as mites, caterpillars, and aphids!
• Known for antibacterial properties that can improve the health of your plants, along with the soil it’s grown in.
• A great source of sulfur!

Peppermint

Have a lot of yard spiders? This companion plant is perfect for your garden!

• Naturally repels spider mites, ants, and aphids.
• A good source of menthol which can be used for its medicinal properties such as cooling and soothing.
• Smells super good and is tasty!

Dill

This whimsical looking greens are a fun and bountiful addition to any garden. These are the perfect companion plants for a cannabis garden for these reasons:

• Attracts natural predatory insects like ladybugs, parasitic wasps, and hoverflies. This keeps the aphid and thrip population down, two common cannabis pests.
• Provides food and shelter

Borage

Everyone needs a variety of flowers in their yard! When adding borage to your cannabis garden, expect these benefits to follow suit:

• Borage is a natural source of a micronutrient called boron, that is important for a cannabis plants lifecycle.
• Attracts beneficial insects with its nectar such as bees.
• Adds organic matter that can improve soil quality.

Chamomile

As sick season closes in every fall, adding chamomile to the garden is perfect! Grow along with your cannabis plants for extra benefits, like:

• Deters pests such as whiteflies and nematodes, while attracting hoverflies for pest control.
• Improves essential oil and terpene production in cannabis plants that are nearby, making them smell and taste better.
• When decomposing, chamomile plants release valuable nutrients like calcium and sulfur back into the soil.

Chrysanthemum

A gorgeous companion for many gardens and gardeners! Well loved for their curb appeal and floral scent, we also recommend adding them to the garden for these reasons:

• Deters ticks and other unwanted pests with natural pest-repelling properties.
• Attracts beneficial insects such as wasps and butterflies to protect your gardens ecosystem.

Soil Improvement

Alfalfa

Did you know alfalfa is a legume? We didn’t. A powerhouse in the garden, we recommend alfalfa do to it’s ability to:

• Improve soil quality with its root system, correcting the soil structure and water penetration.
• Accumulates beneficial minerals for cannabis such as iron, magnesium, phosphorus and potassium.
• Retains moisture, allowing for less watering and more soil protection.

Clovers

Spend time in the garden looking for the lucky 4 leaf clover when you add these lovely little guys to the area! Here are the reason to consider clover:

• Retains moisture, allowing for less watering and more soil protection.
• Suppresses weeds from growing in the garden.
• Attracts beneficial insects such as ladybugs and lacewings.

Cilantro

Even if you inherited the “tastes like soap” gene, this leafy green herb is a wonderful companion to cannabis plants. We recommend this (yummy) addition to the garden for these reasons:

• Possesses helpful pest-repelling properties; Naturally repelling aphids and spider mites.
• Attracts many beneficial insects like butterflies, bees, caterpillars, and ladybugs.
• It smells good!

Beans, Peas, Lentils

While these tiny, tasty greens are great for the body, they provide the earth with beneficial nutrients. We recommend including them in your cannabis garden for a variety of reasons such as the following:

• Their root systems contain nodules that provide a nitrogen-fixing bacteria to the environment surrounding the plant.
  • This bacteria will then take atmospheric nitrogen and convert it into a cannabis friendly form.
• These leguminous plants offer robust, vibrant growth along side soil improvement.

Buckwheat

This fast growing plant is perfect to add when companion planting! Why? Let us tell you:

• Suppresses weeds while being able to improve the soil health.
• Attracts beneficial insects like bees to the garden.
• Contains a high concentration of organic matter, which adds valuable nutrients to the soil.

Yarrow

These lovely flowers not only offer a gorgeous scenery, but wonderful garden rejuvenation properties. Here’s why we recommend these dainty, cute flowers for your cannabis garden:

• Attracts beneficial insects to the area such as bees, ladybugs, and predatory wasps to keep aphids and mites at bay.
• Improves soil drainage quality, keeping roots and plants happier.

Sunflowers

A popular flower choice in our current generation! Did you know that you can use it to help your garden, too?

• Attracts pests such as aphids, snails, slugs, and whiteflies. We recommend placing these flowers father from the cannabis plants to deter there pests from invading.
• Attracts beneficial insects to the area to control pests.
• Due to the height and sturdy structure, these flowers are perfect for protecting your cannabis from wind and harsh sunlight.
• Improves soil health due to the fibrous root system.

Choosing What To Plant

When it comes to what to add in your garden, it really depends on preference. It is always best to grow seeds that you can use once grown out and be able to harvest with your cannabis plants. Herbs and vegetables seeds are the perfect option due to their flexibility in cooking and daily use. Flowers are the prefect option for curb appeal, floral scents in the garden, and many contain medicinal properties.

Another factor to think about it where to plant these seeds once a choice has been made, to avoid pests and nutrients from overflowing the environment. A popular choice is using garden pots to plant these seeds to have control over yard placement. Many people will also carefully map out larger, more permanent, garden beds for their companion plant project.

Remember, these plants do not have to be your plants next door neighbor. They can live together, across from each other or even with a little distance. It all depends on their characteristic and the space you have to offer. Good luck and happy planting!