THE WHEEL. In the nineteenth century herbs were often grown decoratively inside the spokes of an old cartwheel laid flat on the ground. The hub of the wheel raised the rim slightly above ground level, providing a low supporting "fence" as well as a border to the garden. Old cartwheels cannot now be picked up on the side of any busy road as they could be then, and you can't -really grow herbs decoratively surrounded by a defunct inner tube. So, to compromise, try the next category.
THE CIRCLE. This is my favourite shape for growing herbs. The ancients (and Carl Jung), attributed a protective value to the perfect circle, and I have always found my herbs grow most happily in a circular bed. In the centre section, place tall-growing plants such as lemongrass, French lavender or bush rosemary. Then plant another circle outside the inner row of stepping stones, with the medium growers — English lavender, lemon balm, lemon or rose-scented geraniums, marjoram, prostrate rosemary. Around the outside edge of the bed, plant the ground-covers, all the thyme varieties, a few camomile roots, several clumps of garlic and onion chives, and some pennyroyal on the shadiest side, where it will have some shelter from the taller plants.
Now you will have after one season a garden centrepiece that will surprise you with its decorative potential. It has always amazed me that more herbs are not grown for their good looks as well as their usefulness and their perfume and flavour. Some are very showy indeed, and deserve a place in the herbaceous border as well as the utility garden. Chicory (if allowed to flower), the brilliant pink yarrow, santolina with its ferny, feathery, grey foliage and yellow-orange flower heads, and my old friend, tansy, with its 3-foot-high bright green fronds and yellow button flowers, are all worth while. Be a bit wary of putting tansy in the flower garden, though, otherwise you will have a border full of this vigorously growing herb before many seasons have passed. But for that corner where "nothing will grow", plant tansy and stand back.
If possible, avoid planting herbs near the roots of trees. They do not like competing with the voracious roots for the available food, and will grow tall, thin and straggly. Save them a spot in the open garden instead.
Many herbs will grow in the warmth of a rockery or rock garden. But make sure there is sufficient depth of soil in each pocket to give their strong root systems room to forage. One friend who had difficulty with insufficient soil in the pockets complained to me, "I have a lovely rock garden, but it grows nothing but lovely rocks!" I would not advise planting in a rockery any of the herbs required for their roots: you may have to dismantle the whole shebang to harvest the crop. When setting out the plants in a rockery, it is advisable to give them a great deal of water for the first few weeks to minimize the baking effect of the hot sun on the rocks.
So the choice of "where to grow" is really up to you. Be inventive; design a herb garden best suited to your own herb needs; and you will have the satisfaction of being architect as well as engineer and chief labourer.
*12\181\8*
Related Posts:
Tags: Herbal
Tags: Herbal