About

Herb Gardening is a free informational resource about growing culinary herbs outdoors, in garden beds and in pots on a patio, balcony or doorstep. The guides are written for beginners: people who want to grow a few herbs they cook with and would like to understand what each plant needs and why, in plain language.

What the site covers

• Herb gardening basics: a starting guide, planning a bed, how much sun herbs need, and which herbs come back each year.
• Herb guides: growing notes for individual herbs, including basil, parsley, cilantro, chives, mint, thyme, oregano, rosemary and sage.
• Planting: starting from seed, choosing between seeds and young plants, moving seedlings outdoors and timing planting around frost.
• Soil: drainage and texture, preparing a garden bed, and feeding herbs lightly.
• Watering and care: how to tell when herbs need water, how to prune for bushy growth, and how to work out common problems.
• Harvesting: picking herbs without setting the plant back, drying them for later and saving seed.
• Containers: choosing pots and potting mix, and planting a mixed herb pot.
• Seasonal care: what an herb garden needs through the year, and looking after perennial herbs over winter.

The site is about growing herbs outside. Growing herbs indoors in depth, with lights or other special equipment, is outside its scope. It is also not a recipe site: the guides stop at the harvest basket.

If you are new to herbs, begin with Herb Gardening for Beginners. From there, the most useful next reads are Planning an Herb Garden, Best Soil for Herbs and How to Water Herbs. If a plant already looks unwell, go to Common Herb Garden Problems. Every guide is listed on the Guides page.

How the guides are written

Plant facts are checked against university extension sources. Details such as how much sun an herb wants, whether it is an annual or a perennial, and how it is usually started are checked against publications from university extension services and similar public sources. The guides link to the sources they rely on, so you can read the original page yourself.

Zones and planting times are rough guides. A hardiness zone tells you roughly how cold a winter a perennial herb can be expected to survive. It does not describe your summer heat, your soil or the sheltered corner by your wall. You can look up your zone on the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map. Planting times depend on your local frost dates, which differ from one region to the next and from one year to the next, so the guides describe planting in relation to frost and not as a fixed date on a calendar.

No universal watering schedules. How often herbs need water depends on the soil, the weather, whether they grow in the ground or in a pot, and how long they have been planted. The guides explain what to check, such as how dry the soil is below the surface, so you can decide for your own garden.

Problems are explained as possibilities. The same symptom can have several causes. A yellow leaf may point to too much water, too little light, or simply an old leaf being shed. The guides list the likely causes and the checks that help you tell them apart. They cannot diagnose a plant with certainty from a description, and they do not claim to.

The illustrations are original drawings. The pictures on this site are illustrations drawn for the guides. They are not photographs of real plants. They are there to show an idea, such as where to cut a stem or how deep to set a seedling, and a real plant will look different in its details.

Tools, soils and other supplies are described by type and not by brand, so you can use what you already have or can find locally.

Gardening information only

• Not medical, nutritional or veterinary advice. The guides are gardening information. This site makes no health claims about herbs: herbs are covered here as garden plants and as food flavoring, and nothing more.
• Know what you are picking. Identify a plant correctly before you eat anything you grow. If you are not sure what a plant is, do not eat it.
• Follow the product label. When a guide mentions a fertilizer, a pest-control product or another garden product, the label on the product you bought is the instruction to follow, including its directions on amounts, protective gear, use on edible plants and the waiting time before harvest.

Who writes the guides

The guides are written and edited by the Herb Gardening editorial team and published under the site name. No individual author is credited, and the site does not present its writers as experts.

What you can rely on

• We do not publish invented reviews, ratings or testimonials.
• We do not claim credentials, awards or qualifications.
• We do not promise results. Plants are living things, weather varies, and an herb can struggle even when it is cared for well.
• Time estimates in the guides are approximate.

Corrections and suggestions

If something in a guide is unclear, looks wrong or links to a page that no longer works, please tell us through the Contact page. Mention the name of the guide and the section so the problem can be found quickly. Corrections are always welcome.