Flowers & companions
Borage
Pollinators; great with cucumbers and squash.
- Outside
- Direct mid May; self-sows after
- Where
- In ground, near the squash and cucumbers
- Sun
- Full sun; takes light shade
- Water
- Little once established
- Harvest
- Flowers and young leaves, Jun to Oct
Borage is the bee plant stationed near the squash and cucumbers, a bristly self-sower with blue star flowers from June to frost. Plant it once; it handles its own succession from then on.
Growing
Direct sow near the cucurbit bags in mid May and stand back; it makes a rangy three-foot plant that bees work from first light. That traffic is the job, since a squash flower opens for one morning only and needs the commuters already in the neighborhood. Expect volunteers next year exactly where they are useful and in several places where they are not; the extras pull easily. Water the young plants until they take hold; grown borage manages on rain and looks faintly insulted by more.
In the kitchen
The flowers taste faintly of cucumber and dress drinks, ice cubes, and salads. Young leaves do the same job before the bristles arrive.