Phacelia
Facelia · Phacélie
🧩 Role in the garden
- Family
- Boraginaceae
- Height
- medium (40–100 cm)
- Shape
- upright
- Roots
- medium depth
- Sun
- full sun
- Season
- cool season
- Grows in
- summer or winter beds
Jobs in the bed
- Brings pollinatorsFlowers that feed bees and butterflies. Useful next to crops that need pollinating.
- Feeds beneficial insectsSmall open flowers feed hoverflies, parasitic wasps and lacewings, which eat aphids and caterpillars.
- Cover cropSown on bare soil, it smothers weeds and adds organic matter when cut. It does not fix nitrogen, so pair it with a legume.
Rotation
Do not return Boraginaceae to the same spot for 3–4 years. Same family:
✿ Benefit
One of the best bee & hoverfly attractants; also a green manure
✓ Place near
- ✓ Cucumber
- ✓ Squash / zucchini
- ✓ Melon
- Any poorly-pollinated crop
✗ Keep apart
None listed.