Flowers & companions
Nasturtium
Fall-sown; spring bloom; edible leaves and flowers.
- Outside
- Direct sow Sep to Oct
- Where
- Bed edges, poor soil
- Sun
- Full sun; takes light shade
- Water
- Soak in at sowing; then only in dry spells
- Harvest
- Leaves and flowers, spring
Care
- Water
- Soak the seeds in at sowing, then leave the hose alone: poke a finger down and water only in a genuine dry spell. Rich, wet ground stresses it more than drought ever will, and the cool season does the watering here.
- Sow
- Direct sow the big seeds half to an inch deep in September or October, where they can spill over a bed edge, and thin the crowd in place. Fall is the window; this is a cool-season annual, the reverse of the northern spring-sowing habit.
- Feed
- None, and that is not laziness: this is the crop that wants poor ground. Leave the compost out of the hole and skip every liquid feed, because richer soil buys leaves instead of flowers.
- Ready
- Pick young leaves and just-opened flowers from the first spring blooms; neither keeps once cut, so both go straight to the plate. The plants grew quietly through the winter greens season, bloom with spring, and die at the first real heat.
- Trouble
- Aphids mobbing a stem is the trap working: cut the stem off and bin it, passengers included, rather than reach for spray. The other failure is the calendar, a sowing that slides late and meets June heat before bloom.
In a bag?
- Yes
- Up to a 1–5 gal bag.
- Water
- A container dries faster than poor ground ever will; check it in dry spells and water until it runs from the base.
- Feed
- Still none, and use a lean mix over rich potting soil; a fed container grows trailing leaves and few flowers.
- Sow
- A few seeds per container in the same September-October window, set near the rim so they trail over the side.
Nasturtiums run the cool season here, not the summer one. Sown in September or October over poor ground, they spill over the bed edges, bloom in spring, and die with the first real heat.
Growing
The Central Texas annual list files nasturtium as a spring bloomer, and the way to get that spring is fall: sow in September or October with the cool-season garden, grow through the winter greens season, and bloom before the heat kills the plants. Direct sow where they are to live, poor soil preferred and no feeding wanted; rich ground grows all leaf and no flower. Station a few where they can decoy aphids from the vegetable rows, and when a stem loads up, cut it and bin it whole. Left to set a little seed, a stand hands you next fall's volunteers. No Texas source names varieties; the seed rack choice is color and habit.
In the kitchen
Flowers and leaves both eat peppery, watercress with better looks, and they are the salad crop of the flower bed here. Cut them young and use them at once; nothing keeps once picked.