Morning Lovely Gardenning People, picking advice needed!

ecangel24

I'm a bit of a novice Gardener. I have always helped dig and weed my mums vege patch back home. And always enjoyed harvesting all the goodies. But now i'm going it alone and I need some help. I'm sure here is just the place to find it

After a trip to the car boot yesterday, i now have
Rosemary
Sage
Coriander
Basil
Mint
Chives
Oregano
Flat Leaf Parsley
Lemon Balm Mint
Thyme
all potted up in my garden but I'm not sure of the best way to pick the herbs to make sure it keeps on growing.
With long stalky ones like parsley and coriander do you pick just the leaves or the whole stalk?
|With chives do you just take off the tops or the whole stalks again?
If you could teach me what to do for each herb that would be great!

Thank you thank you thank you

noonesperfect

Good morning!

I can't answer your question I'm afraid but I thought I should share what I recently found out about planting plants together or not as the case may be - apparently you shouldn't grow parsley and mint together for example. They hate each other!

Anyway this is the website I found to be a fountain of knowledge.....

http://www.lisa.hafey.org/Companion_Planting.html

ecangel24

just popped outside and rearranged my pots so parsley and mint are no longer near each other! thanks for the tip.

WestonDave

Another thing on mint - plant it in a bucket with the bottom removed if you are going to plant it in the actual soil because it runs riot.

Mint - I tend to pick the tips out - its nicer to eat and it stops it getting all leggy as would happen if you took the larger leaves from lower down the stalks. This will appear to die off over winter but will usually regrow from the roots.

Rosemary as above. This is a semi hardy evergreen - i.e. unless it takes badly to a frost it will stay in leaf over the winter. Not this year but in future years you need to trim the bush (lawn shears will be fine) after its flowered to stop it getting too leggy.

The others are a bit outside my experience but I think with Chives you cut it with scissors a bit like cutting grass - take the tips off and it regrows. Basil is an annual and won't survive over the winter - I'd tend to pick that like Mint.

I'm sure someone else will help fill in the gaps in due course.

katiel

I've just found this site which I think I could spend quite a lot of time browsing as I too am keen to make better use of herbs http://www.herbexpert.co.uk/