Herbs in the Garden

Posts Tagged ‘weather’

Stormy Weather…the ‘not so good’ kind.

These were taken a few minutes ago from my front porch. I thought I’d post them real quick… just in case we blew away and landed in Indiana.

We can’t avoid it.

There is going to be weather.

All around the world there are climate changes occurring.

Various groups have been screaming about climate changes for years. Unfortunately, not all weather changes are in line with the cries of the Go Green, Ecological, Scientific, Impending Doom of 2010,2011,2012, and possibly the Don’t Wear Deodorant Groups.

Before you start emailing me about my lack of political correctness be aware that I myself may fall into several of those categories…

Here in the Midwest the weather has been weird this year…really, the last few years. Just plain weird.

I am sure it has been the same for many of you, so I won’t whine or complain about it and the destruction of my little ol’ herb garden.

I really just wanted to share my new ”Cover it all” gardener’s weather greeting. When I meet you on the street uttering this greeting,  please know this is my attempt to cover all of the ‘weathers’ and give a shout out to our climate change organizations. So here goes:

“My Goodness, we’ve had such hot-cold-wet-dry-solar-flare-el-nino-blizzard-green-house-gas-tornadic-mini-ice-age-la-nina-pole-shifting-weather-lately, haven’t we?”

Yes, it’s a mouthful.

Please tell me, is there ‘anyweather’ (my new word) I have forgotten? Let me know.  I think there’s room for another in the same breath.

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It LIVES! Sage in the Snow

A few weeks ago I posted a bit about leaving some pots of Sage out all winter in the snow.

 Several kind and well meaning emails suggested that by leaving my sage outside in pots IN THE SNOW I was  murdering poor innocent plants. I can only surmise they live in warmer climates.

For all the Nay-sayers…See? It did come back!

 I didn’t just fall off the turnip truck.  I’ve never even been on a turnip truck.

 At any rate, you can see that the Sage is back and although it needs a good trim, it’s doing quite well.

The key to overwintering herbs is to know the hardiness zones of both your herbs and your  location before you neglectfully leave your herbs naked in several feet of snow. Admittedly not all herbs can tolerate the kind of abuse I occasionally dish out- but I know which of my herbs will hang tough around here.

So don’t worry.

For those that worry anyway… in all honestly just the herbs that can take the weather and prairie conditions are the only ones I abuse in this way. The rest are coddled and kept tucked in the greenhouse, potting shed, kitchen window, or strewn around the house.

Yes, you can and it  lives to tell the tale.

Although freezing fresh sage is possible, it’s not the usual was to preserve it.

I have been known to grab some frosted or frozen sage from the garden in a pinch and I am happy to report that the flavor was still fine for cooking.

I dry my herbs, then pop them in the freezer to kill off any lingering insect eggs that may have hitched a ride on the undersides of leaves. Sage is not much bothered by pests, but by habit, the dried herb still goes into the freezer for a few weeks.

This photo shows some potted sage in the snow.

Potted Sage in the Snow

No, it’s not dead, although I admit it doesn’t look terribly healthy at this point.

The good news?

As a perennial herb it will come back in the spring, or when I bring it inside…whichever comes first.

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Anyone who knows me knows that I love my chives.

I think they are the easiest culinary herb in the western world.  Chives are fast growing, quick to cook with (very little prep time)  and they are one herb that I’ll grab to add a mild oniony flavor at the last minute of cooking…or just use freshly snipped.

In the fall I bring in a pot or two of Chives and keep them in the kitchen window. These pots will go for a month or two and provide me with fresh chives. They do like a rest period though, so I also keep several small pots on ’standby’ just outside my backdoor.  This usually means those pots are buried in ice and  snow for awhile, but they like it!  The plants rest and are dormant during this time.

Eventually the chives I brought inside in October start to look tired. I don’t fertilize them at this point, but instead I set them outdoors and just bring in a new pot.

The old pot gets a needed rest and the chives that have been dormant and resting in the snow for a few months are ready to get growing again.

For them Spring has Sprung-even if they come indoors during a January blizzard!

Here is what they look like as dormant plants:

Dormant Chives in the Snow

 I have tidied them up a bit and just several days later you can see they are growing like crazy.

Yes, it’s me with woolcicles forming on my face gear. And yes, I know my cold weather gear is not color coordinated.

Me with antlers and woolcicles

I took a leisurely stroll out to the greenhouse yesterday morning to check on things. It’ was a balmy -2* inside the greenhouse and naturally everything was frozen solid. On the way to the greenhouse I saw that several herbs were heaving up out of the ground in the medicinal herb garden beds.

It happens after a wet fall followed by hard freezes. I will just have to replant the things I will lose this winter.

This is why I rarely have the same garden two years in a row!  Plants come and go, and herbs and plants that don’t do well either get moved, or are lost due to weather conditions.

Although we haven’t had much snow yet, it’s been really cold. More  snow is expected. I like the snow. Besides being beautiful, it protects the plants when they are well covered sith snow. White mulch.

After it all melts though it is a bit disconcerting to see what’s left alive after the winter and what has died off completely, and some years it is just downright discouraging!

I’d better break out the seed catalogs…Who knows? By the looks of it I may be redoing a LOT of garden area this year