In the past, I bought a starter plant of rosemary each summer and put it in my herb garden.  If you recall, my herb garden is jam packed with perennial flowers and herbs, but I always save space for two annuals (Rosemary and African Blue Basil). You can buy rosemary seeds but I’ve heard rosemary is difficult to grow from seed so I just by a small starter plant. Don’t worry because it grows pretty fast.
As for the summer time, I haven’t had any issues with growing rosemary, it likes sun and can tolerate some shade. Since rosemary is a Mediterranean plant, it likes well draining soil and doesn’t like to sit in a puddle!
There are different varieties of rosemary which can have flowers that are white, pink or purple. I have not seen many varieties sold around here. Also, I have never seen flowers on my rosemary plant.
Several years ago, I put a rosemary plant in a large container but I had trouble digging it out before winter hit and the pot was too big for my home. Now if you live in an area where rosemary grows year round as an evergreen, then I would recommend planting it in a pot.
Where we live, rosemary is an annual if left outside. You can certainly extend the growing season by bringing it inside. My experience has been that rosemary doesn’t last as long as I would like in the house. While I can usually get it to last until the holidays which is when we use it the most, it tends to get brittle and shed its needle leaves. My preference is to move it to one of my hoop tunnels to protect it from the frost.
You can cut the rosemary plant into ornamental shapes too. Around the holidays, we always see rosemary plants cut into the shape of Christmas trees.
Stay tuned for a post on harvesting and storing rosemary!
