Flowers In Palm Beach Gardens

Are you a new gardener looking for herbs for your herb garden? Why not try basil? It's beautiful, easy to grow and just tastes and smells so wonderful.

Sweet Basil, or Ocimum basilicum, is a beautiful, dark green annual that is easy to grow inside or out. It's size and growing pattern is manageable, and it can be grown completely indoors, begun indoors and later moved outside, or grown completely outdoors started from seed! Basil can be grown indoors year round, either started from seed or from small seedlings purchased from almost any nursery and many larger grocery stores.

Or maybe a better idea is to begin you basil in late winter or early spring and then move it outside once it gets warm. This way you can begin to enjoy its many uses early in the year, and with a little care it will last all the way to the first hard frost.

If you are a brand new beginner, I recommend getting a few starter plants. Choose a dark green plant with lots of leaves. A six inch pot will see it through it's complete growing season. Line the bottom of the pot with small stones and fill it with a good quality potting soil mixed with a little sand or perlite. If you decide to start from seed, just follow the directions on the package.

Water it carefully- the leaves will do better if you gently push them aside and water under them. Only water when the top half inch of soil feels dry. The leaves, however love to be moist, so mist then often with a spray bottle -- just don't get the soil wet! If you wish, you may add a little liquid fertilizer every third of fourth watering.

Place it in a sunny window or on a well lit counter, and turn it a half turn every couple of weeks. You may begin harvesting it as soon as you can tell that new leaves are growing. It will produce more leaves if you prune it often. Be sure to snip off any flowers as soon as they appear and it will last all season long. Once it's warm outside, you can move it out into the shade a few days and then into the sun.

Basil is great fresh, dried or frozen. A great tip is to freeze the leaves in ice cubes and they'll always be ready for any recipe! It's great in all kinds of recipes- steeped in a little hot water to fill the kitchen with its wonderful, fresh flavor- or even мейд into tea with a little lemon and mint!

Basil is one of my personal favorites. It's just so pretty growing, tastes and smells so wonderful, and has so many uses!

Erin Smart is an herb gardening enthusiast who loves to garden with her family. Together they grow all kinds of organic herbs and vegetables and share seeds with other organic gardeners all over the world. To learn more about herbs for your herb garden mywork.name/loans/go/go.php?sid=1.esmartyherbgarden.info/Primary-Article-4.html], check out her website at mywork.name/loans/go/go.php?sid=1.esmartyherbgarden.info].