I dug up Rosemary because my mother-in-law gave it to me as a Christmas gift, knowing full well that I love the scent of it – always refreshing and invigorating, it makes me feel creative and alive.
I Years ago, Rosemary was considered difficult to grow because of the rather chilly temperatures in where I live – so much so that my Mother-in-law cultivated a line of Rosemary plants which we would often refer to as a dwarf variety.
This ran in the opposite direction of my typicalScotch flavouring – extremely flavoured with a concoction of yeast and dried herbs. Nowadays, it’s far easier to grow and dry Rosemary plants.
Because of its unusual growing conditions, preferable soil and sunlight requirements, and the fact that it will readily self-seed, it is one of the more popular container plants for indoors.
R. latifoliaor Rosemary, is a sort of evergreen sub-tropical shrub with pale green needles and it has very aromatic leaves.
thrive in partial shade indoors – although they do like a bit of sunshine to start.
You can start your Rosemary from seed quite easily as most garden centres have a extensive range of potting quite lovely little shrubs.
Planting Your Rosemary
R. latifoliaor Rosemary can either be planted from root cuttings or as potted plants once they have grown a bit.
Cuttings are the more difficult but may be easier to achieve.
Plant your cuttings in peat or sandy soil with a covering of mulch.
The ideal place to pot them up is a plastic pot – to keep the soil in the pot and to stop the porous nature of plastic pots from becoming damaged. Over time the soil will get harder and you will need to replace the plastic pot.
Planting your Rosemary
Once you have planted your Rosemary, you need to keep them well watered and in fact they will thrive on a drip feed.
The purpose of the drip feed is to keep the fertilizer moist and available to the plant, and it will also avoid the plant from wilting.
Fertilizing Your Rosemary
The experts agree that feeding your Rosemary should be done once a month with a balanced fertilizer.
I do however prefer to use an liquid mix fertilizer with little minerals as it has less reaction with the plant – also it is easier to apply so I tend to use this and adjust later as I’m more familiar with Rosemary.
Then again, if you’re intending to use just a single application of fertilizer each month, you can use a weaker mix than what the experts use.
For established plants, you do not need to fertilize at all.
Pruning Your Rosemary
R. latifoliaor Rosemary may be pruned as simply as any other rose.
Although the plant will tolerate dry spells, pruning is advised if you have a choice. Prune dying or dead wood, weak branches, and thin the remaining healthy branches.
Don’t be tempted to thin the branches in the first year, you will get better results with thick healthy growth, spacing 3-4 feet apart.
Flowers
I have not noticed any annual flowers from Rosemary – maybe this is a quirk.
Care and Feeding
Rosemary will thrive in a light fl watering and so will not need watering every week as some people would.
Rosemary may well be grown successfully in a pot indoors, particularly in a dry heated environment, but this is rare.
I have planted a few Rosemary plants indoors that have survive for 3 years now, and no lessening their Window Sill Box is not an option for me.
Rosemary prefers organically rich soils, and of course, it wIntered in the tropics, so it is ideally suited for this sort of planting, however, I find that its aroma is also useful here for making a health invalid tea.
Harvesting Rosemary
The way Rosemary ages particularly in the second half of the year, determined by its micro-flora, is to produce fine ornamental leaves. Therefore, for use as a winter herb, as soon as you see or hear the new growth start to appear, break off a few branches, leaving only the best specimens with plenty of fine foliage.
Rosemary loves sun at all stages of the year, but must be saying, “if a cloud is going to drop, let it drop alone”, and besides, it is simple to mis-cel yourself into thinking you’ve cut off more than you have.
