My dear Rosemary!

I'm in the midst of clearing the front garden, with lots of interruption in between, rain, an "official driver" for my kids, preparing meals, household chores, blah, blah, blah....!  So meanwhile, here's one of my favourite pot of plant.....Rosemary.

Rosemary is one of my favourite herb. I have a few favourite herbs, I don't actually know which one I like the best, I like all of them! But then again, Rosemary definitely belongs amongst one of the top spot on my list of herbs. 

Rosemary is a woody, perennial herb with fragrant leaves. Rosemary is high in iron, calcium,, and vitamin B6. For more info on Rosemary Herbs, refer to Wikipedia, it is really interesting to read about this amazing herb.

This is my third pot of Rosemary for the last two years or so. Each time it was infested by a small lice like bug, looks like the "kutu" which can be found in uncooked rice grains. The only way to control this lice-like bug is to do it manually, remove them by hand. I do not use the spray as I use the leaves quite frequently. 

Spotted them on my Rosemary plant this morning. Got to remove them soon or the whole plant will be full of them. I noticed that this bug only infest on Rosemary and Sage, they do not infest on other herbs that I placed nearby. Have you seen this bug in your pot of Rosemary before? Get rid of them quick, they won't kill the plant instantly, but the plant will eventually die at a slow pace. Does anyone know the name of this bug?

I have never been successful at propagating rosemary until now, I failed each time I tried. Seems like the last batch that I did a little over a month ago has succeeded! I propagated two stems and both of them have roots now. Rosemary cuttings should be taken from the soft or new wood on the plant. 

I use a lot of parsley and coriander in my kitchen, and rosemary follow closely behind. I have been asked before about how I make use of the herbs from my garden. These are some of the meals that I've made using Rosemary which can be found  over at my kitchen blog. Just click on the name of the dish for the full recipe :

Rosemary Bread

Rosemary Ciabatta Rolls

Chicken Burger with Garlic-Rosemary Mayonnaise

Baked Chicken Wing with Rosemary and Sesame Seeds

Herb Roast Chicken

Pineapple-Rosemary Sorbet


Happy Gardening !

Different Shapes and Shades of Greens

My herb plants  ......

Oregano 

Sweet Basil 

Rosemary

Thai Basil

Sawtooth Coriander

Stevia

Dill

Mint

Thymes

Parsley

Curry Leaf

A Welcoming Surprise

I'm back from my Chinese New Year holidays, and am pleasantly surprised to see that my sawtooth coriander has started to flower! I did a post on sawtooth coriander just before the holidays, on 27th January and there was no sign of the flowers at that time, and yes, I did look and look, and was actually very disappointed that there was no sign of any flowers. So this a wonderful surprise!

Wonder how many flowers will it grow? Dozens I hope! Really looking forward to save more seeds, to share!

My tarragon has sprouted new leaves! I'm so relieved! Let's just hope that it will grow healthy, keeping my fingers crossed. The ones which I propagate from the cuttings doesn't look good. There's no sign of any new leaves, they just look like dead twigs, and I dare not touch them as I'm afraid that I might disturb the new roots, if there are any! Will wait for another week and see.  I have not sowed the seeds yet! Hope to do that these few days as I'm extremely busy with household duties after back from the holidays. 

The miracle of nature. With healthy roots and the will to survive, nothing can stop them!

This really brings a smile to me! 

Happy Gardening !

Tarragon

Tarragon is another herb plant that I bought from Sg. Buloh in August, the same batch with the dill. I did a search from the web, and found out that this variety is the French Tarragon.

These are some interesting facts about tarragon from the web :

"Also known as Artemisia dracunculus, tarragon is a perennial herb and the leaves are used for seasoning, especially vinegar.

Tarragon grows to two or three feet tall and likes moderate sun, preferring a little shade during the warmest part of the day. It grows well in a rich loamy soil that holds moisture, but drains well. Mulching is beneficial to this end.

Tarragon is unique in that during growth, it seems to have little aroma, yet after the leaves or tops are harvested, the oils concentrate and start emitting their unique tarragon sweet smell, similar to freshly cut hay.

Tarragon propagates best through root division, planting the divisions at least 18 inches apart. Since tarragon has a shallow root system, care must be taken not to damage the roots when weeding, and special care must be shown during the winter after transplanting, as the root systems will not have developed fully.

Tarragon is used in vegetable dishes and soups, mild cheeses, egg dishes, fish and white sauces."

The plant started to flower in November, and this interesting info from the web states that there are approx 6000 seeds for each gram of dried seeds! Can you believe it! 

It grows very well during the first few months and even harvested some leaves for my dinner!

These are the leaves which I "harvest" from the plant for a baked chicken, see photo below, 

Yummy!

 Unfortunately, the plant starts to show signs of wilting after it started to flower, 

The flowers of a tarragon plant, yellow in colour and really small

Are these seeds? Further research from the web states that "French tarragon can only be grown from root or stem cuttings, or by dividing an already established plant. Even if your French tarragon blooms, the chance of it actually setting seeds is virtually nil."

 That's all the "seeds" collected

I'm not sure whether I did it right. The flowers are still visible although it is dried. It is extremely small, so it is very difficult to see. These may not be the seeds after all. They may just be the dried flowers! The only way to find out is to sow the "seeds" and wait for them to germinate! 

This is what's left, I pruned the branches, hoping that it will grow new leaves! I propagate some of the stems when I pruned the plant and keeping my fingers crossed that they will root. If all these three methods fails, then I guess, I just have to pay a visit to Sg. Buloh again!

Does anyone knows about the seeds of tarragon? Would appreciate for more details on this. Funny thing is, a search from the web for a picture of the seeds are fruitless. 

There are much for me to learn about growing Tarragon!

I'm linking this to "Seed Week" over at Kebun Malay-Kadazan girls.

Sawtooth Coriander Seeds

It has been almost five months since my last post on sawtooth coriander in September. It has grown quite huge and many young seedlings have appeared by the sides of the pot. The seeds was harvested in December, they are really tiny!

The photos above were taken in September when it started to flower. The flower does not look like a flower! They look more like a cluster of leaves grown together to form a flower-like pattern and in the centre are the seeds which look like the green version of conifer seeds!

This photo below was taken a few weeks before I harvested the seeds. You can see from this photo, the flowers has multiplied, when I counted it was more than 50. And the flowers are spread out to a few 'tiers' from one single stem.  It gets too heavy and taking up space, and they are rather spikey, so I cut off the flower stem at the bottom as soon as it is shows signs of drying. 

This plant can be really big, see how one plant spreads out and occupies the space of the pot.

Many young seedlings growing at the sides of the pot.

The dried seeds.

The seeds are extremely small. (They look like small little bugs, don't they?)  From the 50 over flowers, the seeds collected are only about 1 teaspoon! But imagine if the sowing of these seeds is 100% success, then, that will a big number of plants!

So far, there has been no signs of any flowers from the rest of the sawtooth corianders! I'm really hoping that they will flower soon, as there would be more seeds to share.  I'm liking this to "Seed Week" over at Kebun Malay-Kadazan girls.

Happy Gardening !

Dill Seeds

About 3 months back, I have done a post on dill, here. These are the photos which I have posted earlier in that post. To summarize, I bought this dill plant from Sg. Buloh, along with several other herb plants. My dill plant has since wilted. The flowers are really very beautiful. Grown in clusters of umbels, with tiny yellow flowers. When I did a search from the web, found out that dill is an annual herb with a short life span. How short is short? I've got no idea!

These are the seeds which I've collected. I tried sowing them once but did not germinate. Soon after that, I found some young seedlings among few of my pots! They must have self seeded as the pots are placed around the pot of dill. 

 Found this young seedling and ....

another one.... 

another one growing among my corianders. Got to replant this in another pot soon.

Hopefully my dill plants will grow healthily and provide me with more seeds to share. I'm really looking forward to save other seeds, but my experience in seed-saving is still very new and there are many things that I'm not sure. Apart from the seeds, the leaves are usually picked when mature and dried and then stored for uses in the kitchen. Do leaves already dried on the plants serve the same purpose? I saved the dried leaves from my dill plant before disposing of the plant when it wilted. The smell of the leaves are still wonderful. Any advise from anyone regarding this? Any difference between the leaves that were picked and then dried, and the leaves already dried naturally on the plants?

The only other seeds that I have saved are from my sawtooth coriander. There will be another post on this.

I'm linking this post to "Seed Week" over at Kebun Malay-Kadazan Girls, a fabulous blog about home-grown veggies and blooms, really a pleasure to read and an inspiration for "green-horn" like me!

Happy Gardening !