The Herb That You Want To Keep Far Away From Onions In The Garden

Onions are a common garden plant because they are easy to grow and are also delicious in many dishes across almost every cuisine. Plus, once you've harvested all your onions, they can easily be stored in a root cellar or pickled to last through the winter. Onions are also great companion plants for many common garden vegetables like tomatoes and other nightshades as well, as alliums like garlic. However, despite being good companion plants for most other veggies, there are a few herbs that onions don't grow well with at all, and one of those herbs is sage.

While sage and onions taste great together in many dishes from pumpkin pasta to Thanksgiving stuffing, they unfortunately don't work well together in the garden. One of the reasons for this is that the two plants prefer different soil conditions — while onions prefer wet soil, sage does better when the soil is dry. Additionally, onions can inhibit the growth of sage and can even change its flavor (and not for the better). So, if you are planning to plant both onions and sage in your garden this year, you should space them far apart and place other beneficial plants in between them. This way, both plants can grow without negatively impacting the other.

If you want to plant a lot of herbs and onions this year, then don't worry because there are plenty of herbs that do grow well near alliums, like onions and garlic. These especially include dill, savory, parsley, chamomile, and mint. Dill is a good herb to grow with onions because the two plants enhance each other's flavor. Fresh and dried dill are also useful in the kitchen and go great with fish, potato salad, pickles, and in Greek tzatziki sauce.

If you want to make your onions taste sweeter and have less of a bite, you can try planting savory near them. Savory is an herb that is commonly used in soups, casseroles, stuffing, and stews to enhance other spices and herbs. This plant has the special quality of also enhancing the flavor of onions if planted nearby. The same can be said for chamomile — which is a flower that has natural calming properties when brewed into a tea.

Parsley is a great companion for onions because the two plants work together to keep pests off one another. Mint and onions have a similar partnership, however, most gardeners recommend planting mint in a pot because it grows quickly and can easily take over an entire garden.

Just because onions and sage don't grow well together doesn't mean you can't have them both in your garden. In fact, there are plenty of other veggies and plants that grow well with both sage and onions that can act as a buffer between the two. These plants include brassicas like cabbage, broccoli, kale, cauliflower, mustard greens, and collards. Planting any of these leafy green plants between sage and onion can act as a buffer while also benefiting the other veggies. Both sage and onions have a strong scent that can help repel insects and other pests who normally like to snack on these leafy green brassicas.

Other great options include tomatoes and strawberries. This combination works well because onions can help deter pests while sage can draw pollinators. Other good plants that work with both sage and onions include carrots and rosemary. While rosemary is typically grown next to sage, it also has no problem growing near onions.