I always know the season is transitioning to spring and planting season when bright green nasturtium umbrellas start poking out of my garden. Before I know it, my raised beds are exploding with their jewel-toned flowers.
The eye-catching Nasturtium flower is a perfect companion plant for your vegetable garden and grows in abundance in California Coastal areas. While some home gardeners may view this plant as a bit of a pest (it likes to spread out), there are many reasons I roll out the welcome mat for nasturtium.
Why Nasturtium?
First of all, nasturtium (Tropaeolum) is really easy to grow. Like Jack and his magic beans, you could throw seeds out the window with very little foresight and expect to see them come up in just a few weeks. Their beautiful flowers attract pollinators to your garden with their bright jewel tones and help keep pests (including mosquitos and squash bugs) at bay. If you plant them next to your vegetables, snails and slugs will often go after the nasturtium before they chow down on your more prized possessions. I’m having my best garden season this year because I let my nasturtium grow wild.
Nasturtium prefers full sun, but can also grow in partial shade and seem to do best with a little neglect. It’s a perfect choice for novice gardeners and seasoned enthusiasts alike. This drought-tolerant plant only demands watering once a week, but will also do just fine if you have it on your sprinkler system, making it a hassle-free companion.
But truly the best part about nasturtium (especially if you ask my kids) is that the entire plant is edible! The seeds pack a fiery punch akin to wasabi, while the vibrant green leaves and bright flowers add a sweet spice to salads. Get creative in the kitchen by crafting pickles from the seeds or infusing dressings with the flowers’ colors.
In this blog post, I’ll share ideas for creating a homeschool lesson plan for exploring Nasturtium in your garden classroom and a free Nasturtium activity guide and coloring page illustrated by the incredible kid-lit author and illustrator Carrie Schneider.
How to incorporate Nasturtium into your garden classroom
The best way to learn about plants is to observe them growing in the wild and explore them with all your senses. If you don’t have nasturtium in your garden, these flowers can often be found sprawling across sunny hillsides or in the gardens of your friends and neighbors.
- Observe Nasturtium growing
When teaching kids how nasturtium can be a gardener’s best friend, I first invite them to observe nasturtium growing. We have it growing a bit wild at the Front Yard Farm School, but you may need to go on a neighborhood walk or head to the coast if you aren’t currently cultivating nasturtium at home.
Questions to ask:
- What kinds of bugs do you see on or around the nasturtium?
- What does the soil feel like underneath the nasturtium?
- What does nasturtium smell like?
- Can you find any nasturtium seeds? What do they look like?
- Where do they think the seeds come from?
- Discuss the benefits of Nasturtium for the garden
After observing, your kiddos might tell you that they saw a lot of bees, found a snail or slug hiding underneath a leaf, or that the soil underneath the nasturtium felt cool and moist. Explore the reasons behind their observations.
The jewel-toned Nasturtium flowers attract helpful pollinators to the garden with their bright petals and sweet nectar – like bees, butterflies, and hoverflies. They also serve as a trap plant for garden pests. Trap plants attract pesky garden foes like snails, aphids, and squash bugs – drawing them away from your prized vegetables. The strong scent will even repel certain pests away from your crops!
Nasturtiums also improve your soil health by helping your dirt retain moisture through the natural shade the umbrella-shaped nasturtium leaves provide while their roots aerate the soil.
- Let them eat flowers!
Eating flowers is always the highlight of a Front Yard Farm School nasturtium class. Every part of the nasturtium plant is edible and each part of the nasturtium provides unique benefits. I like to have brave kiddos try each part of the flower (warning them about the different spice levels ahead of time.) The seeds are the spiciest part of the plant and the taste becomes milder as you move to the flower. Honey sweet nectar can be enjoyed if you bite off the back of the flower.
Fun fact – nasturtium translates to “Nost Twist” in Latin for its nasal passage-clearing abilities.
Eating these flowers is not only fun, but good for you! Nasturtiums are high in Vitamin C and zinc and can help stave off colds. They also are a great source (although at lower levels) for iron, potassium, calcium, and magnesium). Explore the peppery seeds, chive-like stems, and mildly sweet flowers in a culinary adventure.
Before eating flowers, ensure the plants are thoroughly washed and raised without pesticides.
- Make Something Beautiful with Nasturtium
Download my free Natusturtium Homeschool Activity Guide, which includes instructions for planting Nasturtium flowers from seed, making pickles from nasturtium seeds and a vibrant salad dressing from the flowers, and a coloring page and I Ate a Flower sticker printable made by the talented kid-lit author and illustrator Carrie Schneider.
My kiddos loved making both of the recipes contained within this guide and adding their pickles and dressings to our summer salads.
Additional ideas for extension activities include:
- Pressing nasturtium flowers to use in home artwork projects
- Collecting nasturtium bouquets for the dinner table
- Looking at nasturtium flowers under the microscope to observe the parts of a flower
- Making fabric dye or flower paint from nasturtium flowers
Tried this lesson at home? We’d love it if you tagged Front Yard Farm School in your photos on Instagram.
Happy gardening!
-Liz