Category: Garden
Simple Setups for Home-Grown Herbs
Who doesn’t love herbs? These flavorful leafy greens are healthy and add an immediate kick to just about anything you happen to be cooking. The toughest thing about them can be finding a consistent supply – dried herbs are never quite as good as the fresh product, and even packaged, processed items can cost a “mint” at the grocery store.
Savvy DIY-ers likely already know the solution, and may have already dabbled in it. Home grown herbs are a godsend for the thrifty kitchen, and are almost surprisingly easy to grow. If you’re interested in adding a few to your garden rotation, try some of these basic setups.
- Hydroponics
Don’t let the name or the reputation intimidate you – hydroponic techniques are becoming more and more accessible for anyone with a green thumb. Hydroponic setups have a few basic advantages. First, they’re enormously productive, and if managed correctly can pump out plants in a hurry. Second, they’re clean, as they rely entirely on water to carry nutrients, instead of soil.
Consequently, this is my favorite solution for small-scale, even indoor grows. It’s certainly possible to scale up, but this takes some extra expertise. Expert homebuilders can make on one the cheap using a template like this one from instructables. Even if that’s a little much for you, some pre-built options exist. Click and Grow makes a very slick “smart pot” that can control nutrients, lighting, and water levels for a small, hands-off herb patch.
- 4×4 Garden
A great, simple choice, and shamelessly borrowed from Bonnie Plants. I personally like the 4×4’s elegance, and the split that it offers between upright and ground-covering herbs. It’s easy to build a planting box if you’ve got some basic carpentry chops, but for those that don’t, just marking out a small area of your existing garden for herb cultivation can give you a similar patch.
- Mixed-Herb Containers
Container gardening’s a good option for herbs, as you can scale down so easily. Given the small size of most herbs, it’s possible to use even a small pot as a container for a few different plants. When planting, try to mix species up based on similar preferences for climate, light, and water.
A classic combination is an Herbes de Provence mix. This classic blend of herbs is a mainstay of provencal cooking, and works well in just about any recipe. It’s made up of Savory, Thyme, Rosemary, Oregano, and Marjoram, all of which are Mediterranean-grouped herbs, and tend to do well with moderate water and bright sunlight.