We have a lot of herbs growing in the vegetable bed and in borders.   Some has been planted and replanted.   Some reseeds and needs controlling, but in general we  like to have flowering herbs and herbs that we can harvest.   We grow lemon balm, oregano, mint, chamomile, thyme, cilantro, parsley, chives, tarragon, basil, sage, lavender, lamium, cress, dill, garlic, and some vegetable greens that can be used for flavoring too.

We let the cilantro crop mature to flower, then let it go to seed, harvesting the seeds as coriander, collecting some seed for next year, and letting some seed for a fall harvest.

 

Chamomile can be a bit invasive, but we let it grow in patches, then we harvest the tiny flowers for herb tea.

 

Oregano grows back every year and it will spread if allowed to reseed.   The small pink flowers are a favorite of pollinators.  We harvest the leaves in fall, but we always end up with too much.

 

We grow a variety of greens for salads and stews, then we let a few plants flower and go to seed.   We collect the seeds for next year’s spring planting.

 

Every year we grow red scarlet runner beans on poles for the flowers and a few beans for the dinner table.

 

We planted feverfew many years ago, but we found it invasive so we pulled it out, but a few plants still manage to come back every year.

 

Lots of flowering herbs in the garden means lots of pollinators too so we go out with the cameras to capture the visitors in season.

 

Now our garden herbs are in a winter freeze, but many leaves were harvested and dried in a dehydrator for winter and spring use, a bit every day.