Harvest Herbs Tips

Herbs are the plants grown in the gardens for the purpose of flavor, scent, or medicine. There are many herb plants that can be added in cooking to get the special taste for your recipe. The herb gardens can be planted in the minimum space in your flower garden. If you don’t have flower garden in your backyards, you can also plant these herb gardens in the containers and keep these containers in your balcony or kitchen. Such gardens are called kitchen herb gardens. When you are planting such gardens, it is important to know the proper herb gardening tips so that you can easily grow and maintain these gardens.

Herbs are the wild plants that generally do not require much attention for growing. When you have planted the herbs in your garden, you must wait till the herbs are ready for harvesting. When they grow completely, they should be harvested on time. The article discusses some tips for harvesting the herbs. For long term preservation, it is important to follow the proper harvesting tips and store the herbs after harvesting in right way.

Harvesting the Herbs

It is important to choose the proper harvesting time for harvesting the herbs. Harvest them after complete growth. The inappropriate time and weather may cause disintegration of oil in herbs. It is best to harvest the herbs in the morning. The soil is moist during the early morning hours that will prevent the herbs from producing rich amount of oil and the oil will remain stored in the herb. It is usually done after the dew has evaporated from leaves of herb before blossoming.
It is not possible to harvest the herb completely. It is suggested to keep one third part for regeneration of plant. Whenever you harvest the herbs, it is important to check the insects on the herbs and remove the affected leaves from the plant for future use.

Freezing is the best process for storing the herbs. It is most often used for storing the culinary herbs. Parsley, thyme, basil, coriander, celery, oregano, etc. are some of the herbs that are frozen for storing. You can add them directly in your recipe.

The herbs like lavender and borage need to be harvested before they are fully grown. If you want the herbs for seeds, harvest them when they begin to change color. The root crops like golden seal should be dug at the end of the summer or at the time of early fall.
Below are some tips for harvesting your garden herbs:
• Give sufficient time for new plants for growing in the garden before the first harvest
• Harvest the herbs on the same day when you will use them to preserve their freshness
• Do not harvest one third of plant at a time
• Use sharp scissors for making cut on stem and do not pluck the leaves
• Harvest the culinary herbs before the plant produces blooms
• While harvesting the annual herbs, harvest from the growing tip of the stem to increase the leaves and reduce flowering

The herb gardening tips will help you to know the proper harvesting techniques for different types of herbs. You can follow these tips for maintaining your herb garden properly.