Winterizing herbs

This past spring we planted herbs for the first time. Now we need to know what to do with them for the winter. Reading posts here, it seems that everyone converts their basil into pesto and freezes it. So that solves one plant problem.

We still have parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme, and chives to handle.

What do folks do with these herbs for the winter? One local has suggested the rosemary can be brought inside in a pot.

Mike, I bring all my herbs inside in pots for the winter. I love having fresh herbs on hand on the kitchen windowsill.

If this is impractical for you, you can dry all of those, and or freeze the chopped herbs in small amounts of water in ice cube trays, then pop them into bags just like you would stock or pesto.

Beware the chives, btw. They love to take over wherever they are planted. I plant them in one of two ways.... either in a pot, or in a sunken 5 gallon bucket with the bottom cut out. It helps to contain then.

Of the herbs you have listed Mike, only parsley is an annual. Actually it will come back the following year, but go directly to seed.

Rosemary, unless it is a winter hearty one, needs to be brought in as you have been advised. We have had lousy luck doing this, having succeeded only once in several tries. This year we have planted three varieties that are supposed to hearty to Zone 4. We shall see.

All the others just need to be trimmed back and mulched, and should come back fine in the spring.

Here's what I do.

I make pesto to freeze basil...the leaves don't freeze well.

I am no fan of most dried herbs so I try to preserve them as leaves.

I pick many sprigs of thyme and oregano and roll them in a paper towel, separating a few springs with each roll so that they have their own pockets; then, I place the rolled towels into a plastic bag and freeze. In winter they can be called upon at will. This same procedure works well for sage and even tarragon leaves.

Parsley will continue to grow until the first frost and even after that if the weather is relatively warm for winter. During winter's depths, no fresh parsley. The stuff is miserly in pots, unless they are BIG pots.

I grow rosemary only in pots--outside during the growing season, back in the house for winter...same with my laurel, fig, and lemon trees.

Chives...I forgo them for the winter! But next spring I am erecting a greenhouse to grow winter vegetables. Would have done it this year and had planned to, but grave family situations took time away from that project.

Mike,
Our winters here in Indy are similar to your's and I think Carl has given you some good advice, although we've been relatively successful with Rosemary if grown in a protected area and mulched. We do experience some winter-kill some years, but some agressive spring pruning doen't seem to bother these hebs at all. Chives are a weed.
Bill

Sorry Mike, I thought you wanted to know how to have them to eat in winter.

Carl's right; they are perennials. But be warned, a really nasty low temp. winter with minimal snow cover can give you serious kill.
Still, I've got thyme, oregano, chive, sage, and even parsley in the ground that have been there for years.

The parsley is in three different areas so that each year one area seeds while another grows parsley and another usually gives me trouble...they seem to know their place!

Sorry Mike, I thought you wanted to know how to have them to eat in winter.

Actually, either option is workable for us but probably prefer to have fresh available during the winter. But we definitely are not sure how to do either!!!

Sorry Mike, I thought you wanted to know how to have them to eat in winter.

Actually, either option is workable for us but probably prefer to have fresh available during the winter. But we definitely are not sure how to do either!!!

On most of them, frozen is the closest to fresh, unless you have winters in the forties F.

You can look into hydroponics...which I am sure would require building a new wing on the house Or think about what I am doing: the greenhouse for winter vegetables.

For everyone: The "winter hardy" rosemarys we are trying this year are the varieties Barbeque, ARP, and Madaline Hill. These are all available online, and we will report back in the spring. Do any of you have experience with any of these?

They all have great aroma, but the Madaline Hill has the best. The other two have been slightly more vigorous.

This past spring we planted herbs for the first time. Now we need to know what to do with them for the winter. Reading posts here, it seems that everyone converts their basil into pesto and freezes it. So that solves one plant problem.

We still have parsley, sage, rosemary, thyme, and chives to handle.

What do folks do with these herbs for the winter? One local has suggested the rosemary can be brought inside in a pot.

Mike, the sage and chives will survive the winter unless we have a really cold winter. The Thyme may survive, but I doubt that the parsley will survive and I have never had a rosemary plant to survive, even though Robin says his is several years old. My herb garden is a ways from the house in the back yard so is not protected. Another herb that survives well is tarragon, that will actually try to take over the entire garden, as will mint. If you planted the rosemary in a pot then yes you can dig it up and bring it in. Of course you then have a problem of where to put it so that it gets sunshine at least half the day.

You can look into hydroponics...

Hmmm... Hydroponics. This is one of the few times I've heard it mentioned with, how shall I say, innocent agriculture.

It figures in many jokes around Mendocino County (northern California) where one wine expert quipped to me that his industry was served by agriculture-supply firms that do a brisk business in hydroponics, which was not used for any produce you could buy in the supermarket.

Most of you in this thread must have hard winters. In the milder zones that don't get too far below freezing, plants like rosemary and sage show what they're made of, literally. Like pine needles, they contain dense oils rich in natural anti-freeze -- terpenes and so on. (That's where much of their flavor comes from.)

Max, winters here in the Central Kentucky area normally get down in to the single digits several times per year. We also usually get a day or two where the low temperature is subject to drop below zero. I replace some herbs in my garden every year, and some only when they die from old age. I have never had my rosemary make it to January, but, I have had one sage bush for about 8 years. Now, it is giving up the ghost and I need to replace it. Parsley, oregano, and basil are the others that I have had no luck in wintering over. Thyme will usually go 4-6 years and grow to maybe 24-30 inches in diameter before finally failing. Tarragon wants to take over the garden and seems to live forever. I will have a chore to dig a bunch of it out before winter sits down. Even though I pinch off the purple seed heads my chives seem to keep spreading too. I probably should just cut them back to the ground when they start to seed. Herbs are a lot of fun, and they taste good too.

Most of you in this thread must have hard winters. In the milder zones that don't get too far below freezing, plants like rosemary and sage show what they're made of, literally. Like pine needles, they contain dense oils rich in natural anti-freeze -- terpenes and so on. (That's where much of their flavor comes from.)

Of course, Max, I was being cheeky with that hydroponics mention.

As for hard winters--have you ever been in the Finger Lakes region in February? By then, the oil in sage and rosemary has long since retreated into "petrify;" hell, even some unnatural anti-freeze might.

I get a kick out of catalogues that tout the "winter hardiness" of certain plants that I know couldn't survive a winter here--because I've been burned by the ads, or frozen by them...

I get a kick out of catalogues that tout the "winter hardiness" of certain plants that I know couldn't survive a winter here--because I've been burned by the ads, or frozen by them...

Been there, done that! I too was often so disappointed with "cold hardy" varieties of plants when I lived there, Thomas.

Well, here in South-Central Texas my herbs usually last through the winter. Those that don't I will just buy in bunches at the market and keep them in a glass of water on the window sill.

rwj

As for hard winters--have you ever been in the Finger Lakes region in February? By then, the oil in sage and rosemary has long since retreated into "petrify;" hell, even some unnatural anti-freeze might.

Yes (worked three winters there). For long periods it was far enough below freezing that ice layers stayed on sidewalks for months -- a peculiar dry kind of ice, which sublimated slowly into the air without melting. (This seems typical of cold interior regions, unlike the slushy winters familiar in the coastal eastern US.)

As for hard winters--have you ever been in the Finger Lakes region in February? By then, the oil in sage and rosemary has long since retreated into "petrify;" hell, even some unnatural anti-freeze might.

Yes (worked three winters there). For long periods it was far enough below freezing that ice layers stayed on sidewalks for months -- a peculiar dry kind of ice, which sublimated slowly into the air without melting. (This seems typical of cold interior regions, unlike the slushy winters familiar in the coastal eastern US.)

Sidewalks? Here?

Maybe he was up in Rochester or someplace like that!

Not Rat-chester (as the locals pronounce it) but Ithaca. Lots of sidewalks, some steep; lots of ice on them, lots of pedestrians walking on it yet rarely slipping because it didn't get warm enough to get slippery.

Ah, Ithaca. Yes.

Ah, Ithaca. Yes.

Oh, the BIG CITY!!!

Whenever I am in Ithaca I get an urge to grow a ponytail, wear bell-bottoms, and tie some die.

Isn't that what you always look like, Thomas?