Grow basil! For real. Basil is the cash crops of cash crops. I think next year we’re just going to grow rows of lettuce, basil and whatever else we want for our own consumption. It seems like this year we planted a lot of things with the intention to sell them. That’s fine, because we have to pay the bills somehow, we almost have too, so far so good. Getting back to the basil though, we’re getting $7.50/lb right now from the local organic grocery distributor. Plus basil thrives the more you cut it, it just gets leafier and leafier. Batta bing.
Aug6
2greenthumbs's Weblog 
Ooh! Ooh! I have a gardening question for you.
I have a little urban garden that I planted earlier this summer. It’s just a bunch of terra cotta pots with herbs in ’em on my window sills.
They get lots of sun and I’m good about watering them and I bought organic plants and I used organic potting soil. I thought they’d be flourishing by now but… No so much.
I’ve got thyme, rosemary, lavender, oregano, sweet basil, thai basil, oregano, spearmint, cilantro, and a little tomato plant.
The thyme, rosemary, and lavender are just fine… I couldn’t kill them if I wanted too. The tomato is a special plant meant for potting, so it’s doing pretty well– I’ve got two little tomatoes on it right now and a whole bunch of flowers. But the rest? Not so hot. The basil are the best of the worst, but they look unhappy. The oregano and spearmint are limp and sad and the cilantro is just plain pathetic. It’s got about two little stems drooping over the edge of the pot and that’s it.
The problem is, I don’t know what’s wrong. Do they have too much water? Not enough? Too much sun? Not enough? How can I bring my plants back to life?!
I saw that you said that thing about trimming them, so I trimmed them all back last week… That didn’t really help. The look just the same, except now they’re missing some leaves.
Save my garden!
Samantha,
not sure about the what exactly is wrong, but herbs LOVE sun, and usually don’t need much else, could it be a bug?
oregano, just grows about anywhere, in Seattle I used it as ground cover and had to CHOP it down every 2 wks or so, it went nuts. came back every yr. even with 200+ inches of rain!!
if they are limp, could be to little water, keep the soil at least moist.
keep trying and good luck