Grinds topic of the day: herb gardens (e.g. basil)

Havana Moon said:
I think you mean fluorine! Anyway they are historic names for elements. Apart from exceptions like tantalum and the American spelling for aluminium, the majority of metals discovered in the 19th century and beyond end in -ium. Let's here it for Californium, Americurium, Einsteinium, Cerium, Samarium, Neptunium, Fermium...
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Indeed I did. You know what sucks more than soft consonants? Fucking autocorrect.
 
Havana Moon said:
Call us old fashioned but -ium is an ending for many elements especially metals. Magnesium, chromium, sodium, potassium, lithium, thallium, radium, iridium, osmium, palladium, rhodium, titanium, uranium; polonium, thorium and beryllium to name a few!
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We use the -ium ending for those also. I think aluminum is an outlier.
 
ThatOwlWoman said:
I built an herb garden in our teeny tiny urban backyard when we lived in STL. (see pic) Grow what you'll eat. Herbs are generally super unfussy and don't need a lot of fertilizer. Just sun and water. I built this one with bricks to keep them separated because some of the perennial herbs will spread and take over. I planted sage (p), chives (p), German thyme (p), oregano (p), basil (annual), and dill (annual). Watch out for mint, it's super invasive! If you want to dry them to save pick them before they flower, early in the morning. I save those brown paper bags they put your wine in. Put the stems/leaves in those and set them in a dry dark place to cure. If you want fresh leaves for something you're making just pick them as you need them. Rosemary is my absolute favorite herb to grow. It's not hardy though unless maybe in California or Texas or Florida. Mine is in a huge pot that we lug in every fall and put back outside in the summer. I've had it since 1998.

Peppers are an annual. They like lots of heat, water, and fertilizer. You can grow them in pots, one plant per. If you keep picking them they'll keep producing but eventually they conk out because annual. Hope this helps.

Herb garden:
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Rosemary in winter bloom:
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damnnn that's a shit ton of rosemerry

so how much work does all this involve? And do you find yourself having enough supply overall? I always thought it'd be easy to go through an herb garden pretty quick, as I am unsure of the yields one can get with something simpleish
 
BillyShouldPostMore said:
damnnn that's a shit ton of rosemerry

so how much work does all this involve? And do you find yourself having enough supply overall? I always thought it'd be easy to go through an herb garden pretty quick, as I am unsure of the yields one can get with something simpleish
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The hardest part is preparing the beds for the plants. One full-sized basil plant keeps me supplied till the next year. Dill is a ferny, small-leafed being. I need 2-3 of them to last till the next year. Thyme, being a perennial, starts out small but comes back each year a bit larger. Once it's about a foot across that's plenty to last a year. You don't want to strip the perennials bare of their leaves, obviously. Don't know how much you cook, or how often you use herbs, so hard to say what quantities you'd want to plant. Maybe if you tell me which ones you'd use the most and would want to grow?
 
ThatOwlWoman said:
The hardest part is preparing the beds for the plants. One full-sized basil plant keeps me supplied till the next year. Dill is a ferny, small-leafed being. I need 2-3 of them to last till the next year. Thyme, being a perennial, starts out small but comes back each year a bit larger. Once it's about a foot across that's plenty to last a year. You don't want to strip the perennials bare of their leaves, obviously. Don't know how much you cook, or how often you use herbs, so hard to say what quantities you'd want to plant. Maybe if you tell me which ones you'd use the most and would want to grow?
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basil, thyme, rosemary, various peppers
 
BillyShouldPostMore said:
basil, thyme, rosemary, various peppers
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Thanks. Basil as I mentioned is an annual. You might want to start with two plants. Pick the tips of the stems as it grows to keep it bushy -- the bushier it is the most leaves you'll get. You can pick leaves as it goes along to use fresh. At some point, depending on your heat/light/humidity, you'll notice that the central stem is sending up a stalk. That's when you'll want to pick many leaves/stems if you plan on drying the basil to use the rest of the year. You can put them in brown paper bags to dry. This keeps you from losing any that fall off during the drying process. Basil is kind of a "wet" thick herb so drying will take a while, unless you dehydrate the leaves in the oven or in a dehydrator. Crumb them up once thoroughly dry and store in jars or plastic bags.

Thyme is easy to grow; it's a perennial. Like most herbs it wants plenty of sun, warmth, but not a lot of fertilizer. Once again with this guy you will notice flower buds forming. That's the time to pick leaves/stems to preserve. Again, the paper bag works well. Thyme has pretty tiny leaves so if you dry it out in the open, on paper towels, you'll lose some. It doesn't take as long to dry as basil. The first year you probably won't get flowers. You can mulch it well in the fall but it's not absolutely necessary unless you have very cold winters w/o much snow (snow is a great "mulch").

Rosemary is a tender perennial that won't survive temps below 28F or so. It's best to grow it in a pot and bring it in for the winter. It will need a sunny window, good drainage, and to be watered thoroughly at least once a week. If you let it dry out completely it'll probably die. I prefer fresh rosemary so pick leaves (which are little needles) as needed. You can also dry it. If it blooms for you it's awesome! The flowers are tiny little orchid-like lavender blossoms. The plant in the photo is in full bloom.

Peppers need a lot of heat, sun (at least 6 hours/day), plenty of water, and lots of fertilizer. If you grow them in pots try using a liquid foliage fertilizer like Miracle Gro. Make sure your pots are plenty large! The bigger the pot, the bigger the root system and the more peppers you'll get. Are you looking at hot peppers?

I like to let my herbs blossom because they're super attractive to our pollinator friends as well as hummingbirds. You can still use them fresh or dried if they blossom; the flavors just aren't as intense.
 
BillyShouldPostMore said:
My new goal is to have one new topic about some random thing each day, until I inevitably lose interest in doing this. Todays topic is herb gardens

what are everyones thoughts on herb gardens? I'm talking something small and manageable. Is it worth it? How long does it take stuff to grow and do you get enough? Or is it like you pluck some leaves and that's it. Basil, rosemary, thyme etc. Also, peppers. How many habeneros can you grow. Is it one and done?
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you would grow no peppers in an herb garden.......
 
BillyShouldPostMore said:
so how much work does all this involve?
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as compared to stopping at an organic food store and buying the herbs and peppers you want figure it would be some where around ten times more work and twenty times more expensive to have an herb garden.......then factor in that you would forget to water them while stoned and everything would die........
 
BillyShouldPostMore said:
damnnn that's a shit ton of rosemerry

so how much work does all this involve? And do you find yourself having enough supply overall? I always thought it'd be easy to go through an herb garden pretty quick, as I am unsure of the yields one can get with something simpleish
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For the lazy grower, you can use an aerogrow, and grow herbs, lettuces, and hot peppers all year round indoors. My peppers ended up being way to big for the system though, as they got about 4+ feet tall. At our place we have oregano, and apple mint growing like wildfire. If you don't tend to herbs outdoors, that can happen, and they will be everywhere. Best to keep them in a closed bed.
 
Jade Dragon said:
For the lazy grower, you can use an aerogrow, and grow herbs, lettuces, and hot peppers all year round indoors. My peppers ended up being way to big for the system though, as they got about 4+ feet tall. At our place we have oregano, and apple mint growing like wildfire. If you don't tend to herbs outdoors, that can happen, and they will be everywhere. Best to keep them in a closed bed.
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Especially mint which can be super invasive!

In our herb garden here we have bee balm, chamomille, lemon thyme, English thyme, yarrow, oregano, chives. It's not inside the deer fence; even so, they leave it alone. The dill and basil get planted in the veggie beds in between other things, inside the fence.

Speaking of deer, we've had coyotes hanging around lately. They drove all the deer away and back up into the mountains. Still over a foot of snow on the ground, but here and there bits of bare Earth are starting to peek through. And all the trees have bare circles around them -- means the sap is starting to rise!
 
ThatOwlWoman said:
Especially mint which can be super invasive!

In our herb garden here we have bee balm, chamomille, lemon thyme, English thyme, yarrow, oregano, chives. It's not inside the deer fence; even so, they leave it alone. The dill and basil get planted in the veggie beds in between other things, inside the fence.

Speaking of deer, we've had coyotes hanging around lately. They drove all the deer away and back up into the mountains. Still over a foot of snow on the ground, but here and there bits of bare Earth are starting to peek through. And all the trees have bare circles around them -- means the sap is starting to rise!
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We need to grow a bunch this year, and save some money. Michigan has what's more akin to hills, and cliffs, then mountains, I'd say. They're nothing like out west, but can still be rugged terrain.
 
Jade Dragon said:
We need to grow a bunch this year, and save some money. Michigan has what's more akin to hills, and cliffs, then mountains, I'd say. They're nothing like out west, but can still be rugged terrain.
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We always have way more than we can use; I'll send you some! What herbs do you like to use most?
 
ThatOwlWoman said:
We always have way more than we can use; I'll send you some! What herbs do you like to use most?
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Mom uses basil, and parsley a lot. I tend to be tricky in what I use though. Rosemary is the most used, but Mom already bought a plant of that. Plus it's a way to con myself into being active, if you have to grow the stuff. After this winter I need some serious activity.
 
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