The Amazing Benefits Of Growing Marigolds In Your Garden & Flowerbeds

Welcome to the Simple Garden Life Podcast, a program dedicated to keeping the yard
of gardening simple, fun and always rewarding. Now Here are your hosts,
Jim and Mary Competti. Hello and welcome everybody to Simple Garden Life Podcast.
I'm your host, Jim Competti, along with my wonderful wife Mary Competti,
and I say wonderful today Mary, because we're talking about the mighty marigold.
Yeah, it's one of our favorite plants in the world. Mary made a
little fun of me when I made the sun name up for the podcast today,
but honestly, as you're gonna hear, the marigold is mighty. It's
it's an amazing flowering annual that can do so much more than just add big
color to your landscape. And we're gonna get into that in a little bit,
but I want to thank you for joining Simple Garden Life. This is
episode two o eight or in our second season. Now hard to believe,
but we really enjoy it. We get a lot of emails, keep them
coming. You can email us at anytime to the farm at owgarden dot com,
whether you have a garden question or whether you have an idea for a
podcast. We love to hear from you, and we we answer everybody and
we enjoy doing it too, so it's always fun for us, especially in
the midst of garden season. Absolutely, you know, we do it every
morning. We open up our inbox and start answering garden questions first thing in
the morning, and I can't wait to hear what the comments are about the
mighty marigold. That's right. Well, if you haven't yet, make sure
you get to Simple garden Life dot com and you can sign up there any
of the articles. You'll have the pop up bander there to sign up.
If you have any problem, you can always email us at the farm and
we'll put you on the list as well. But that'll give you access to
all of our garden articles on the site, all of our other sites including
Oval Garden Farms. This is my garden, make your meals, Simple Garden
Life, and also I cook for two as well, so it's a great
way to sign up and get notification of the new podcast and also our other
articles. So with that being said, Mary, it is time to start
talking about the marigold. And you know, for me, I grew up
my mom loved marigold. She always had him outside and I think over the
last twenty years, it kind of became that that's an older person's flower.
Absolutely. You know, I had a very different experience growing up with the
marigolds. You know, I couldn't stand them because the smell of marigolds is
very pungent. Well, it's funny because that smell actually helps in a lot
of ways. But you're absolutely right. Whenever I would collect seeds from my
mom at the end of the year, I'd have that smell in my hand.
It doesn't matter that the smell comes through the foliage, it comes through
the bloom. And you're right, it's very distinct. But you know,
we grew up with those marigolds kind of fell by the wayside. Over the
last ten to twelve years. You had weight petunias that came out in the
nineties and all of these other exciting flowers. Yeah, and they just got
stronger. Well, now marigolds have made this huge resurgence, and one of
the reasons, in fact, probably the biggest reason, is how much they
bring in the way of help to other plants that you grow. And we'll
get into that. And I think there's also so many different varieties now of
marigolds that you know, it's not Grandma's marigold anymore. That's that's exactly right.
I mean, you know, they add intense color and beauty. That's
the one thing about marigolds that people don't realize. You know, they can
be in yellows and oranges and all types of different hues of that, and
even cream. You'll get some cream colored marigolds now, which are a little
bit more rare, but you know, they can go anywhere hanging baskets,
they can go in containers, obviously, in flower beds, and as we'll
talk about, we do it. We do it right in our garden because
of the benefits sabring. Absolutely. You know, you drive around and you'll
see gardens just full, fully lined with marigolds, and you know there's a
reason for that absolutely. Well, when you talk about the benefits of growing,
it all really starts with what we just talked about. The color um
just absolutely stunning, bright, vibrant color in a marigold. It's not a
dull color at all when that's in bloom. And I guess that's the first
part, but the second part is it really covers a plant. You're not
talking five or six blooms per plant. No, And you know, the
blooms last all summer long. If you if you treat the marigold right,
you're gonna have color all all summer long. It's right. And they can
come in any different size. I mean, it's not just that typical French
marigold that is so common. There's also miniature marigolds. There's my favorite is
the pom pom pom poms. I mean, these these can literally, you
know, we say tennis ball, but I mean I've seen some that probably
come closer to a softball than a tennis ball, depending on the variety.
And they can really I mean, people look at them and they're like,
what is that. They don't even realize it's it's a marigold. So obviously
the color, the sheer amount of blooms, and I mean it's really incredible
when you talk about how much they can bring just on their own, without
all the other things we're going to get into. But then you have the
second part of it, which is the ease of planning and growing. They're
a very inexpensive annual to grow for several reasons, but they're also extremely easy.
Yeah, they actually grow in all types of soil, Yeah, they
do. I mean, you can have poor soil, rich soil, they're
going to grow. Obviously, with a little more nutrients, they're going to
be a little bit more powered up. But they're going to survive. I
mean, they're really going to thrive when you give them a little bit of
that extra. But they also you know, sewing them. We talk about
this, you know, I see them all the time in stores as transplants,
and we've grown a few when we want to put them in pots in
our own seed, you know, from home. But it's just a pla
you don't need to buy as a transplant because it grows so quickly from seed.
Right, you can just sprinkle the seeds down in the soil, lightly
covered water man, and within just a few weeks you're going to have full
sized marigolds. Yeah, an eighth inch of soil does the trick and you're
right within from seed to flower. Marigolds can flower in as little as six
weeks. I've seen them flower before. You'll get the first blooms and buy
eight weeks they're in full bloom. Well, you know that's what you're doing
outside anyway, when you're trying to bring a transplant in and they catch up
so quickly. And the other thing about marigles is they grow better in place.
We talk about this with a lot of plants. Sometimes plants don't handle
transplant in as well. Marigolds just do so well directly from seed, and
they catch up so quick. It's almost, you know, smarter to plant
that way because it's an easier way to take care of them. And when
you start planning seeds, everybody always asks us, you know, should they
be in full sun, full shade? Well, marigolds are really great because
they can tolerate a little beach, they can tolerate full sun. Be super
hot, but they can have up to two to three hours of shade a
day two that's right. And they're extremely drought tolerant. This is a plant
that's not You're not going to come home on a hot day. You've been
there with impatients, you've been there with pegunia's way, petunias. They're all
fantastic, but you know the droop, we call it the droop. You
come home, they're like, oh, I gotta get some water on the
right And in the middle of summer sometimes you have to water those plants twice
a day, where marigolds are a little bit more forgiving. They really are.
You can go to sometimes a couple of days without hitting the marigolds and
they might start to look a little dry, but they're not going to have
that big droop so quickly, so they just really are, you know,
give them a chance again. I mean, look at all the varieties.
The other part of transplants versus seed are when you go in We talk about
this all the time, but you're only going to get the common varieties.
You know you're gonna get. Hair is an orange marigold, right here is
the yellow French marit. Yeah, and that's all you're gonna get. And
I get it. Stores have to make you know their money and they can't
grow all kinds of exotic types of marigold because they don't know if they're gonna
But boy, when you go to look for seed packets, and we'll have
some links for seed packets on the Simple garden Life dot com article for this,
Oh skies the limit there are, like you said, to palm palm
varieties. There's all kinds of marigolds from giant too small to firecracker. Right,
you can buy almost anything, and it really does open up on a
whole new set of color. But here's the deal, though, Jim as
like all of our plants, make sure you get your seeds early because they
go quickly when the word starts getting out about them. Yeah, you really
do. I mean you find your seats. A lot of times. You'll
find marigold seeds even on the seed racks, and they'll have some more rare
types there. But you can go online and find others. But here's the
final thing, and then we'll get into the real benefits of why you want
to grow. So it's when I said an expensive, it's inexpensive because this
is one seed that you're gonna buy one time and one time only because you
can save them so so easily. Right at the end of the seasons.
As during the season comes, you know, you start deadheading off the plants
and you'll have a whole handful of seeds ready to go, and all you
need to do is saving for now hundreds hundreds of seeds per you know,
each of those blooms and you just roll your finger and they come out,
and you know it's funny, miracles are a plant that you could actually take
those seeds right there, put them right back in the ground and they're going
to actually come up again if you wanted to plant more. It's it's that
kind of thing, but you can save so many. Yeah, remember the
time I actually dropped the seeds in the flower bed and we had marigolds growing
all here. Long I do, but you know that always works out for
a reason. We laugh about that, but then that became one of my
favorite spots to visit in the garden. So, okay, so we've covered
all the reasons that you want to grow them from an aesthetic standpoint. You
know, they're they're beautiful, they're hardy, they last long. They're hardy
in the sense that they're going to handle weather. They're not gonna they're not
gonna handle winter, but they're gonna handle a hard you know, summer,
heat, dry, you name it. They can handle it. So we're
gonna take a break and when we come back, we're gonna get into the
other side of why you really need to be growing marigolds, and you're gonna
be surprised. I mean, they have made a huge difference in everything from
pest control to helping bring in more pollinators, which is great for you know,
your balloons and your vegetable garden or your flowers. So we'll get into
all that when we come back from this break. This is why it's called
the Mighty marigold. That's right, the Mighty marigolds. So we'll take a
break right now and we'll be back in just a second with why the Mighty
marigold is the plant you should be planning this year. Okay, and we
are back with the Mighty marigold, and we're going to get into some of
the reasons now why you want to grow marigolds. We have to talk about
this real quick. You know, we do have a we have to have
a couple ads at the beginning, in the middle of our show and end.
But that is what allows us to bring the podcast and make it free
for everyone, and we're always happy to to do that. So that is
why. And we try to keep as short as we possibly can and so
we can get to the real meat and the heart of the thing. And
Mary, let's start off with the marigolds. And I mean you really talk
about pest control. Yeah, you know, they've taught by many people to
be natural repelling. It's all kind of pest in the garden. Oh yeah,
everything from tomato, hornworms, squash bugs, cabbage worms too. You
know, those are the insect past bright up to rabbits, deer, squirrels
and you name it. And here's why you said something that started this show.
That is really the reason. And you kind of have to understand it.
That pungent smell of a marigold is as annoying to those pests as it
was to you growing up as a child, right and it you know,
it's really not horrible smell. It's not like an awful smell, but it's
just a different type of strong odor that a lot of pests don't prefer.
No, and so everything, you know, we talk about the tomato plants
and when we plant them a lot at in fact, we use them all
through our tomato garden and all through our garden. But with tomatoes it's really
nice because you know, hornworms they can't they just don't like the marigold.
And hornworms are one of the worst things that you can have to attack tomatoes.
But it's a double edged sword for that. So not only did they
you know, do they keep them from coming in, but they also the
marigolds I'm speaking about attract paper wasps because wasps love to have their pollen and
come in to visit and they help pollinate. So they're helping to pollinate tomatoes
because they're visiting the marigolds. But then wasps have another a big, big
thing for hornworms. Right. They actually will lay their eggs on the back
of hornworms and which will eventually kill them. So, you know, are
also the ones that pollinate tomato plants. People don't always realize that, but
they're much more than a honeybee. Ever, touches wasp are the real things.
So that's where we talk about, you know, pestiterrent repellent by growing
these it's amazing. So I think that leads us really well into our question
of the week right now, Mary, Right, we got this question from
Rose, and Rose I believe lives into luth Minnesota, and she asked,
how close should I plant marigolds in the garden next to my tomato and pepper
plants to get the benefit of repelling pests. It's a great question. We
get this one a lot, and then it really is and you know,
we've written some articles and talked about it. But okay, so here's what
we say. In our tomato plants. We have an article on this,
and we'll included on the link about growing tomato plants with marigolds. But you
know, you want to plant a couple of plants around your tomatoes. How
close we like to go about eighteen inches out. I don't like getting so
close that you're going to interrupt the root structure of the tomato or take any
nutrients. But again, marigolds aren't huge feeders. They're not going to take
a tremendous amount from the soil. But if you plant a plant eighteen inches
or so around, we like to plant a couple, one either side down
our rows in between each one. That's gonna be enough. It's gonna bring
them in. Can they be three feet away? Absolutely, they're gonna bring
them. But obviously the closer they are to the tomato plant, the better
it's going to be. So And actually, you marigolds, you can plant
one inch apart from each other. Oh you can. You can plant a
couple right there and put them, put them around the edges. And again,
don't go spend a lot of money on transplants. As you plant your
tomato plants, or you know, when you're doing just throw some seeds in
the ground. The tomato plants are small. They don't need a lot of
help at that point or protection. There's not a lot of pest out those
first three or four weeks. Within a couple of weeks, here comes the
you know, the marigold plants up and they're going to catch up quickly and
they're going to grow, and they're gonna have a little bit of shade from
the tomato plants early on, and it's going to help them. It's it's
gonna help the tomatoes though, once they start blooming and bringing in those wasps
and repelling pasts. Yeah. Another question we might get too, Jim,
is we talk about planting basil with tomato plants. You know, can basil
and marigolds be planted with tomato plants the same thing? You can plant them
boat together with it. And basil is great to plant with your tomatoes because
it can actually you know, it brings, it repels other things. But
it also is said to improve the plate flavor of your tomatoes. So great
call there, and a good thing and a great question from rose. Um.
Okay, I want to go one more step. If you can't plant
in your garden, let's say, well, I grow in bucket containers,
or I grow in a raised bed. Well, you can still plant in
the raised bed if you want to, but you can also plant some marigolds
in a pot. We've done this before, right around and set it right
near the plant, and it's a great way to not even touch the soil
strength of the of the plant, but you're gaining those benefits. Yeah.
You know when people are using marigolds to try to deter rabbits or deer,
you know you really have to line the perimeter of your garden all the way
around with solid marigolds. You know, is not a guarantee that they're going
to stay away all the time when there's some smart deer and rabbits out there.
Yeah, but you know you really do have to line them up across
the perimeter of the garden. Yeah, it's not like a single marigold plant.
Deer's like, whoa, I can't go in there, But no,
it does. And if you know, I always used to love We live
very close in Ohio here to the Amish community, whose are big gardeners.
Obviously gardeners. Boy, you can't go up there without seeing the gardens encircle
with either cosmos marigolds or a combination of both, and it's exactly that reason.
So trust me, it works. Yeah, And I know we'll get
an email saying, you know, it's false information that marigolds work. And
you know what I say, why not give it a try. It's inexpensive,
it's easy to do. It can't hurt, no, and it really
does. I mean, there are certain pasts that just don't like them,
and so it's going to help the larger animals, like you said, a
deer it can, and rabbits it will. But yes, you said,
you're right, you have to plan a little bit more. So we talked
about, you know, how they can repel those pasts, and you're right.
I mean you're talking squash bugs, horn worms, cabbage worms, and
the rabbits and the deer and squirrels. But they also attract some of the
best insects that you want in your garden, and those are the pollinators.
And without pollinators, nothing's gonna nothing's gonna happen on your vegetable plants or your
flowers for that matter, because they need pollination in order to bloom, right,
And the pollinators that they attract are the honey bees. Butterflies, moss,
wasp, all of them. They're all tried to to marigolds. You
just stamed off four of the best pollinators around. And you know we talked
about the big bloom set of a marigold, Well that is going to bring
them in. Honey bees love the nectar. They're going to visit. You
know, you're talking hundreds of flowers per plant they're in there. Well,
guess what's right there, there's your other plants, your other flowers. They're
going to visit them all. And remember, bees don't just come one at
a time. They go back to their high and they do a little dance
and they explain to everybody, Hey, this is the motherload. We're going
to go out there and find this. So it really does. I mean,
it's amazing. If you don't prescribe to the theory that it can detract
from pasts, there's no denying that marigolds are going to bring in a tremendous
amount of pollinators, including those wasps that can take care of your hormone pros.
So basically, in summary, more marigolds goes, more pollinators, even
more fruit and vegetables in the long run. Yeah, I mean there's no
doubt about it. And go to that next step that we're going to talk
about real quick, which is they also attract other beneficial insects, not just
pollinators ladybugs. Ladybugs absolutely love marigolds. Well, what does a ladybug do.
It eats a tremendous amount of aphids and the afid larva. So there's
there's again. I mean, marigolds are just the top of the line for
the parasitic lost. They're going to bring them in. They love coming in,
they have lace wings. All of these prey on harmful insects in your
garden. So again, even if you say, well, I don't know
if it deters them, it's bringing in ones that don't deter them. They
like to eat them, right. And I know a lot of people that
actually buy ladybugs and put them in their garden. You know, marigolds are
a great way to track them naturally. Yeah, that's a whole other story.
It's so hard because you can put them in there and do they really
stay you know, no, they go to the neighbors that has more marigles
than you do. But it's it's a great way you have ladybugs, you
have good things going on in your garden. So it really works like those
mighty marigolds. That's right, that's right. So one final thing before we
end our podcast today that they bring. I know you're probably already amazed at
how many good things they bring, but I'm going to pay for this mighty
marigold in common, I can tell. But anyway, I'm going to prove
that they're mighty because they also handle one more issue that is big and it
can really cause a lot of garden problems, and that's nematodes. People don't
really always know what nematodes do, but you know they it's hard. They
feed on the soil underneath. Okay, so they're going to feed on the
roots, and sometimes you don't know things are happening until it's too late and
they just kill the plant. You can't see them, no, you can't.
Well it's so you know, they don't just feed on tomatoes, but
peppers and a lot of other vegetable plants. And you know, they feed
and they slowly drain and deplete that energy from the plant, and then the
process those roots decay, the plant weakens and at the end it ultimately dies.
And so nematodes can stay in that soil for a long long time.
But here's the funny thing. The roots of a marigold actually produce a chemical.
This isn't this isn't the smell of their foliage or anything else, and
it's extremely toxic to nematodes to the point where it's going to kill them and
clear the ground. And it's amazing when you plant them near or in a
vegetable garden, they will clear that devastating pest in a heartbeat. And if
you've had nematode problems in the past, I will tell you right now,
plant marigolds in that soil all over the place and you will end that problem.
That chemical that is produced kills them and it's gone. And a lot
of times people think it's a lack of water or it's something else, and
when it's really these nematodes underneath the soil, feeding on the roots killing their
plants. Right, it's so easy to plant the marigolds right there, and
you know they're so beneficial and getting rid of the nematodes. It's really the
great thing to do. I know, so I'm done, I know I've
espoused all of the things I can talk about for the marigold, but you
know, give them a try. They are beautiful everywhere. They're easy to
save, they're easy to grow, and at the end of the year Mary
said it earlier, take you know, a handful. You don't need a
lot. Take a handful of your best bloom flowers, you know, scrape
the seeds off or just roll your hands. They'll fall into a paper baggy.
I would go through all the rigamaru of telling you how important it is
to save seeds at the right temperature, because you do with a lot.
Marigolds don't really matter. You probably throw them and you're covered in the garage
and they're going to be fine next year. And the great thing about marigolds
seeds, who is are large. They're not tiny little like lettuces are large,
and you can find them, and you can easily find large. Then
they almost look like paper. I mean really, they're just kind of along
with that little furbid. You're right, you can get hundreds of them per
plants. So try out the marigolds, and you know, you know,
write us an email at the end of the year and you tell us they're
mighty too. How's that, Maria. We'll get lots of those. I'm
sure all right, finish this up. I'll stop now and remember whatever you
do, find the fun and gardening and grow something beautiful. Until next week,
everybody, happy gardening. We hope you've enjoyed this episode. Subscribe to
the Simple Garden podcast on iTunes, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or most of
your favorite podcast apps. You can also head over to Simple gardenlife dot com
where you can listen and read all of the show notes to every episode and
if you have any questions, any ideas for show topics, or if you
want to share your favorite garden tip, email us at the farm at owgarden
dot com. Until next time, Thanks everyone,