Subject: [Homestead] Big basil and other features of a hot climate
Date: Thu, 14 Dec 2006 10:18:41 -0700
Upon returning here to Phoenix a couple weeks ago I found two huge
rounded weeds growing in the raised herb garden. Resisting the
impulse to simply rip them out of the ground I began cutting them up
in chunks, the better to place into the trash container. Putting
vegetative matter into a trash container is painful for me, but that
is grist for another post.
Only upon whacking off three-foot limbs of the woody weeds did I
discover that what I was whacking was basil! At Heartwood we grow a
couple dozen basil plants each year and take the leaves for basil as
fast as the plants grow enough to prune appropriately. This continues
to the first frost. So I have never seen full-size basil. These
things were humongous, about four feet tall and as wide, looking more
like tumbleweeds than anything else in my brain's photo library. I
pruned the wood down to less than a foot, saving some tiny green
buds. Don't know if they will make anything or not.
The second delight was finding about a dozen baby basil plants that
had become seeded from the mature plants. Again this is new
experience. Basil is very frost intolerant but I might try to set an
insulated cold frame over a couple plants back home to see if I can
get baby plants this way.
In the same bed, which has ferrocement walls three feet tall, are two
rosemary plants. One, a trailing variety, has become a gorgeous drape
of green plus the tiny blue flowers which are keeping bees happy. The
other, a culinary variety, had become so shaded from the giant basil
that it languished, though now expanding nicely with plenty of sun.
Also still growing is a tomato plant that became so shaded it is
stretched to the south for several feet until it found sun. It has
some green fruits on it and plenty of blossoms, although night temps
will preclude germination.
And of course the oregano, with old stems to be pruned away but
magnificent fresh green stems for pizzas. Oregano is also a perennial
at home but does not grow so lush after cold weather. There has been
a frost here, as evidenced by black tips of some tomato leaves.
So the automatic water system paid off.
[Homestead] Big basil and other features of a hot climate,
Gene GeRue, 12/14/2006