Borage is one of the easiest plants to grow from seed, growing very quickly in a short space of time to produce tall, robust plants. The stems and leaves are rather coarse and prickly, but the starry, sapphire-blue flowers make up for this ungainliness, catching the eye with spots of intense colour. Also known as starflower, the plant is widely used in herbal medicine, the oil from its seeds used to reduce inflammation and balance hormones. The flowers and young leaves are edible, with a fresh, cucumber-like flavour. The flowers can be scattered on salads or steeped in drinks, or sugared or candied to decorate cakes or cookies.

The common borage, Borago officinalis, can have flowers of variable colour, with the blooms often opening pink and then changing to blue. A white form, B. officinalis ‘Alba’ is also available. Borage likes full sun and a poor soil, and it will self seed freely if it is in a spot that it likes: in fact it seeds around so readily that you will almost certainly find yourself having to pull out unwanted plants. Grow it as a filler if you need to pad out gaps in a border, or let it self seed around the edges of your vegetable patch as I do, to provide insect-friendly flowers as companion plants. Sow seed direct into the soil as soon as it has warmed up in spring, scattering it thinly wherever you want it to flower.

Back to The Flower Garden main page. To buy a copy of The Flower Garden book click here.