Asparagus Companion Plants – What to Plant (and What to Avoid)
As a perennial vegetable, asparagus is a convenient crop to grow. Plant it once and well cared-for asparagus crowns can live and produce for decades! Sounds good, right?! Now let’s find some asparagus companion plants to make the most of your garden space.
Since asparagus crowns stay in place and the ferns and spears come back every year, it makes sense to search for the best companion plants for asparagus.
As you contemplate what to grow with asparagus, be sure to consider growing requirements. This should help you to find plants compatible with asparagus for the garden, raised bed, or container.
What are the best asparagus companion plants?
The best companion plants for asparagus may be tomatoes, basil, and parsley. Together, all four of these plants play nicely together and offer benefits in the garden. Other good planting companions for asparagus include lettuce, spinach, peppers, eggplant, strawberries, and lots of different herbs.
Even a few flowers make fine partners in the garden for asparagus crowns and ferns. For the most part, you may find that asparagus is rather agreeable as a neighbor in the garden.
What are the worst companion plants for asparagus?
Avoid planting alliums like garlic, onions, shallots, leeks, chives, and ramps near asparagus. These crops can negatively impact the growth of asparagus plants. Do not plant potatoes or carrots near asparagus either. Both root vegetables may compete for space with the asparagus crowns.
Asparagus Planting Companions
Once you decide where you’ll plant your asparagus, look at companions. This helps you to make the best use of all the available space in your garden.
Fruit and Veggie Planting Pals for Asparagus
Since asparagus is a longtime commitment, it helps to compare other vegetables and fruits you’d like to grow.
See if any of these are a good fit for your tastes and your planting layouts.
Beets
With a small footprint and a relatively short time in the ground, beets usually do well when planted near asparagus.
Grapes
Lettuce
Lettuce grows quickly with shallow, surface-level roots. Consider growing lettuce and asparagus together for an easy companionship in the garden.
You can also plant a succession crop of lettuce later in the summer for your fall harvest!
Asparagus, Rhubarb, Strawberries, & Horseradish Combo
Other perennial vegetables can be great bedfellows for asparagus. Try asparagus and rhubarb companion plants with strawberries and horseradish as well.
This way, you can expect all the crops to grow back each year and the garden bed doesn’t get disturbed so much.
Allegedly, rhubarb grows very well with asparagus, strawberries, and horseradish. In fact, this perennial combination seems to be a popular asparagus companion planting recommendation across the web.
Since I can’t begin to explain it quite so well, I’ll point you over to a post from John Vivian at MotherEarthNews.com. Here, he goes into great depth talking about the asparagus and rhubarb, strawberries, and horseradish planting bed he’s used time and again.
Growing any combination of the asparagus rhubarb companion planting combo should work well for your garden.
Asparagus and Strawberries Companion Planting
If you don’t like horseradish but love strawberries, you could even do asparagus and strawberries companion planting instead.
Planting asparagus and strawberries together works well because the roots thrive at different depths. This means both plants can enjoy nutrients from the soil!
They’re also early crops where you can usually harvest them at the beginning of the growing season for most other crops.
Asparagus and strawberries do multiply on their own. Keep in mind that you may need to maintain your containers or asparagus and strawberry beds by dividing and transplanting at some point.
Spinach
Like beets, spinach also doesn’t take up much space and completes its life cycle in a reasonably short time. Therefore, spinach can be a good companion to asparagus.
A later crop of spinach toward the latter part of summer could also grow alongside asparagus.
Nightshades
Some nightshades make good companions for asparagus.
Tomatoes
A great companion to asparagus, tomatoes are known for emitting solanine, which helps to repel asparagus beetles. Meanwhile, asparagus can help to repel nematodes, helping out the tomatoes.
Eggplants
Like tomatoes, eggplants can also emit solanine to keep the asparagus beetles at bay. Eggplants also enjoy the benefits of asparagus as a companion plant.
Peppers
Peppers usually grow nicely with asparagus as with different maturing timings, they don’t compete for space.
Companion Herbs for Asparagus
Asparagus grows nicely with so many different plants. Consider planting a variety of herbs nearby asparagus. (Just make sure the companion plants like each other, too!)
Here are some good asparagus companion herbs to consider.
Basil
Basil can help to repel asparagus beetles. When flowering, basil is also a pollinator magnet, making it a great plant companion in general.
Parsley
Parsley also helps to ward off asparagus beetles in the garden.
Anecdotal gardening evidence suggests asparagus also grows well with these companion herbs:
- Cilantro / Coriander
- Comfrey
- Dill
- Oregano
- Sage
- Thyme
Companion Flowers for Asparagus
Besides fruit, vegetables, and herbs, you can even choose a pretty flower as a companion for asparagus.
Flowers add stunning color to the garden. Select flowers may offer helpful pest control properties or other benefits as planting companions.
- Asters
- Marigolds
- Nasturtiums
- Sunflowers
Plants to Avoid Growing Near Asparagus
Avoid planting these crops near your asparagus crowns:
- Carrots
- Chives / Garlic Chives
- Fennel
- Garlic
- Leeks
- Onions
- Shallots
- Ramps
- Potatoes
What We Grow with Asparagus
In our asparagus patch, we like to grow Roma tomatoes and basil. Tomatoes, basil and asparagus grow well as planting companions.
I also love growing flowers near my asparagus plants. The flowers add lots of color to the garden and our zinnias attracted lots of pollinators last year.
We even had monarch butterflies right in the same garden bed!
Do you have any other suggestions for good companion plants for asparagus or any to avoid? What do you do in your garden?
Shout at us in the comments with any asparagus companion tips or questions you may have – we love hearing from you!
Happy Gardening!
