Herb Growing Tips & Tricks
One of the most important tricks in cooking is to use the freshest ingredients possible to ensure that the flavours are as prominent as they can be. Luckily, with a herb garden right inside your kitchen, you cannot get any fresher.
Since herbs do not need a lot of direct sunlight, they will be quite happy in a window sill in your kitchen where you can see and care for them every day.
Let’s dive into some tips and tricks for helping your herb garden to flourish so that you can start experimenting with different flavours in your cooking.
1. Start with Potted Herbs
The first thought that every gardening aspirant thinks is that they need to run to the store, grab a couple of seed pouches and plant the seeds. While there is nothing wrong with this, it is significantly more difficult to grow a plant from scratch than from a seedling.
So we recommend that you start simple and buy some pre-potted herbs from the local gardening centre or supermarket. With some sunlight, nurturing and care your herbs will start growing in no time.
But, if you are up to the challenge, then go ahead and try to grow some seedlings!
2. Choose the Right Pots
The next step, which applies to both pre-potted plants and seeds, is ensuring that you have chosen the right pot for your herbs to grow in. You can choose from window boxes and a variety of pots but the most important aspect is drainage.
If your pots do not have sufficient drainage then your herbs will drown.
Terracotta pots are among the top recommended pots for your plants because they are porous so the soil will not be suffocated. Terracotta pots are also good conductors of heat so water dries up quickly to avoid drowning your herbs.
It is important to water your herbs every day but be wary not to overdo it.
3. Soil Drainage
When it comes to planting your herbs it is also important to choose the correct soil. Richer soil might seem like the better idea, but it can actually be a bad thing. Experienced gardeners have said that richer soil has poorer drainage which, we now know, is bad for your herbs.
Most herbs are not picky about the soil in which they are planted.
As long as the soil has good drainage, your herbs will grow happily. If your soil is hard or too rich, it is a good idea to include some coarse compost to help ensure that the water is draining properly and not drowning the plants.
Research also shows that herbs grow better in coarser soil.
4. Prune your Herbs
Worried that your herbs are not ‘bushy’ enough?
To encourage foliage growth in your herb garden, it is important to prune the plants frequently. While it might seem counter-productive to cut the growth off of your herbs, it actually helps them to grow faster and fuller.
Once the herbs begin to flower they will not get any new foliage growth from the stem that is flowering. To avoid this, simply cut off the flowering part of the herb so that it will continue to grow.
5. Propagation vs Seedlings
As we discussed at the start of the article, growing herbs from seed can be quite challenging. This is why most experienced gardeners recommend propagation before growing from scratch.
Propagating is the easiest way to grow more plants from already healthy herbs. Simply cut 4 inches off a non-flowering stem, remove the leaves from the bottom two inches and place the stem in a glass of water.
After two to four weeks you should see roots beginning to form. Once you see enough roots you can plant the stem into a pot or your garden.
Which Herbs Will Improve my Cooking the Most?
There are two types of herb types that you can choose from soft herbs and woody herbs.
Soft herbs are more delicate which means that they need more care and attention when growing. These herbs are only added at the end of cooking or are folded into salads to introduce their flavours.
Soft herbs include basil, coriander, chives and more.
Woody herbs are more resilient but need more water during growth too. Do not be alarmed if the lower branches die out – just keep pruning your herbs to encourage healthy growth.
Woody herbs include rosemary, sage and thyme.
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The golden rules to remember are to keep your herbs watered, to prune regularly and to give your herbs enough space to grow and expand.
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