Harvestr.Org

Harvesting herbs is an integral part of growing healthy herbs in your herb garden. Harvesting is the process of gathering or reaping the herbs at different stages of maturity depending on the herb to maximize its utility and life span.

Why are we harvesting herbs?

Harvesting herbs both early and in regular intervals ensures new and fast growth of the plants. For instance, cutting flowering herb plants such as lavender and tarragon to half their original height in early July promotes a second bloom in the fall.

How to harvest herbs?

As the herbs grown for their leaves have the tendency to lose flavor once they flower, they are best harvested before that. Picking leaves when they are tender is the best way to harvest since the tender leaves contain high concentrates of oil that is both fragrant and tasteful. Mint is harvested by picking only its leaves. Care should be taken not to wash the leaves for the fear of losing the aromatic oils. There are flowering herbs such as lavender, chamomile, and borage that are harvested before they bloom. Harvesting herbs that are grown for their seeds such as dill, coriander, caraway, and fennel should be carried out as the seedpods change color from green to brown or grey.

When do we harvest herbs?

Since herbs grow pretty fast, they are ready for harvest quite frequently. It is a consensus among herb garden lovers that the best time to harvest herbs would be right before they flower. Not that we have anything against herb flowers but once the flowering starts the herb plants channel most of their energy into the petals instead of the leaves thereby affecting the strength of their flavor. Herbs being early morning plants hit their peak at dawn. Hence, the best time to harvest would be during the mornings after the early morning dew has dried up but before the day begins to heat up. End of summer or early fall is the best time to harvest herbs like ginseng and goldenseal that are grown for their roots.

Harvesting herbs is the healthy way to grow them in your herb garden.