The Herb Garden Replant Plan
Even herbs can succumb to unusual weather – here’s my plan to replant the herb garden after a particularly hard winter.
Hello, friends! I recently began the replant of our back door herb garden that was pretty much decimated by our -10 degree weather we had this last winter, and I thought I’d take you along on a little tour with some details of the replanting plan.
I actually was pretty surprised at the losses, since this herb garden is located up agains a southern-facing wall of the house. But the only things that survived without any damage were the chives (and really, what can kill them?) and a variety of low-growing thyme called Lime.
Just to help you feel my pain (ha!) above is a look at the garden last October – lush and slightly overgrown. After cutting back and looking at everything, here’s the final tally of the perennial herbs that were lost:
- Two 5-year old rosemary bushes
- A 3-year old French tarragon
- Two French lavender plants
- A 4-year old lemon verbena
- A potted sweet bay (this was iffy – not surprised by this)
- Two spearmint plants
Herb Garden Replant
I was able to cut back and replant a start from the huge oregano plant, and it’s doing well, and I’m attempting to see if the common thyme and variegated thyme will regrow from the two sad-looking partial plants above (the Lime thyme is in the foreground).
Looking at this picture, though, makes me think I really just need to replant these, too. Sigh.
The Updated Layout
As long as I need to replant, I’ve decided to go with a different layout, which I’ve tried to illustrate in the picture above.
The biggest thing I want to do is to find a fountain that is self-contained because when we removed the huge deck we found a pipe for something in the ground under the terra-cotta lid you can see to the left of the middle pot (which is just there as a place marker). So, no planting there and no diy bubbling pot fountain like I thought we’d do. UPDATE: Go here to see the herb garden with it’s fountain!
I want to provide some vertical interest with a couple of small trellises in the pots where I’m growing spearmint and peppermint (I learned many years ago to NEVER plant mint in the ground…). I’d also like to get some narrow lattice for the side of the deck and house foundation, which I’ll just lean it against to cover the not-so-nice stuff going on there. UPDATE: check out the garden tour here with finished deck sides.
And of course I’ll need to finish purchasing the replacements. The garden center where I bought the mint, sage, parsley, and lavender did not have any rosemary or Italian parsley. I have three basil seedlings hardening off this week to fill their spot and I would like to find a small herb to plant in front of the future fountain – do you have any suggestions for me?
My herbs didn’t do so great here in Ohio either. I lost one lavender, but it wasn’t in a protected area. The lavender in my herb bed i thought I lost and when I decided to go dig it up there were brand new shoots coming up from the base at the ground. So apparently the roots survived and spared the plant. My small leave oregano is just fine and my potted chives on the deck are only half coming back. But I know they’ll multiply (which is why they’re up on the deck in a pot!). I just bought a mint plant last summer and planted in a pot on the deck, but it didn’t survive. I’m hoping that it’ll survive more normal winters so I’ve bought a replacement. My alpine strawberries are just thriving! And my garlic is also coming up extra strong and large.
My lemon thyme, a creeping variety, i thankfully had a large patch of, because half of it died. š
It’s just about my favorite herb! I use it any time thyme is called for in a recipe, and with chicken or turkey, gravies, stocks, etc. thankful i don’t have to start completely over with that!