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How to Grow an Indoor Herb Garden
Growing an indoor herb garden is a great way to bring herbs into the kitchen when cooking. A few herbs grow easily on a windowsill all year long. You can also use this method as a way to start seeds that you can transplant them outside later when the weather is better. Containers for indoor herb gardens can come in a variety of shapes and sizes. They are made from different materials like terra cotta, heavy duty plastic containers, and most often ceramic pots. It is important that even plants that are grown indoors have drainage holes so that the roots don’t drown in too much water.
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With any container used for indoor herb gardens, make sure to put at least one inch of stones in the bottom to help with drainage. The pot needs to have a saucer, so that the water doesn’t overflow all over the place. The perfect size pot for one herb plant is six inches in depth. If you are growing more than one plant, the bigger the pot the better. Putting pots up on plant stands and organizing them either by style of container or type of plant is a great way to group your herb garden together.
Choose a good quality potting soil like Black Gold 16-Quart All Organic Potting Soil or Supersoil Potting Soil 10 Qt – Pack of 4 Make sure to add in the soil amendments before you plant your herbs. Fill the container ¾ full with potting soil that has bone meal, blood meal, and earthworm castings already mixed in. Bone meal is an organic fertilizer that helps the roots grow and blood meal is needed by the leaves and flowers of the herb plant. With an indoor herb garden, you will need to add this amendment mixture at least once a month.
The most popular herbs to grow in an indoor herb garden are basil, thyme, oregano, marjoram, parsley, and chives. Basil likes a larger container and needs a lot of sunlight so put it in the sunniest spot you have. Parsley can get large if its roots have room to grow, otherwise it will stay small. Both thyme and oregano have shallow root systems and are good at trailing down out of their pots. Both garlic and onion chives grow just like grass and do well in small containers. All herbs need at least 6-8 hours of sunlight, with a minimum being 4 hours. Plants that don’t receive adequate sunlight will not grow as well.
Once the herbs are at least 6” tall, snip off a few leaves to go into your recipe. Herbs need to be harvested at least every two weeks to stimulate new growth. When harvesting, make sure to take the leaves down to a growing node, so that it will produce more edible stems and leaves. Chives on the other hand, need to be snipped down as far as you can go with these plant snips
Having an indoor herb garden makes many home cooks quite happy as they have fresh herbs for their amazing recipes!
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