The amazing diversification themes with the windowsill or window-box gardening is limited only by your imagination. Without exaggerating, you can have cucumbers, basil, lemon verbena, curry plant, tomatoes, alfalfa sprouts, onions all of them in a single apartment windowsill. You can put all your talent, skill and handicraft in designing the “Windowsill Home Herb Garden” in a 30 storey building with a small and narrow neglected unused space. Windowsill herb gardens are fun to create, not too expensive and extremely useful in the kitchen for the freshness and aromas they bring about, through out the year. There is a pretty long list of herbs that can grow in the pots and usually do not require too much attention other than sun,soil and water. The herbs do not need soil heavily loaded with fertilizers as the herbs tend to lose the natural aroma from excess fertilizing. Liquid fertilizer or organic compost is best for home grown herbs since the chemicals are negligible in such natural fertilizers. You can also put your creativity in use by implementing Lasagna gardening for an immaculate soil-less gardening.
Basics of Windowsill Gardening
The numerous herbs that grow successfully in a windowsill environment can be purchased from local nurseries or garden stores. You can either use a cutting or the seeds of the plants for propagation. Some of the most popular and easily grown herbs are basil, chives, mint, oregano, rosemary, cilantro, thyme, sage, marjoram and parsley. Generally, chives and mint are easier to grow and good choices for those novice gardeners who are just putting their hands into gardening for first time. Chives can be used in salads or vegetables. Mint has an extraordinary strong aroma and can be used in soups, salads, and beverages. Basil is one of the main ingredients in pesto a green Italian oil-and-herb sauce. The leaves of coriander or cilantro are used in chutneys, sauces, curries and soups. Rosemary, oregano, thyme, sage, basil, and marjoram are all wonderful culinary herbs used for seasoning and garnishing meat, sauce and vegetarian recipes.
Soil-less Windowsill Gardening
You can use a soil-less potting mix for propagating the herbs for your windowsill garden. Place the herbs in a clay, wood or plastic container using a soil-less potting mix. Soil-less mediums contain natural minerals and are good for drainage. They are also free from any soil-borne disease. Leave at least two inches of space at the top of the container for watering. Herbs do not need too much of water hence water only to make the potting-mix moist. Lasagna Gardens for Windowsill are the latest craze in organic herb gardening and very easy to implement if you are fed up of digging and tilling the earth. It is a very popular form of gardening and you can use it for a herb garden too. The idea behind Lasagna gardening is layering. The main theme of the Lasagna gardening is creation of layers with organic compost and absolutely no weeds to worry about. Select a sunny location. The sunniest spot in your window-sill is the best place for Lasagna gardening. Start the layer with a very wet newspaper, top it with peat moss and cover it with a thick layer of organic compost which can be home grown or brought from garden store. Repeat the process with alternate layers of newspaper, peat moss, and organic compost until your lasagna garden is as thick as you want it to be. Put water in the Lasagna garden until it has the consistency of a wet sponge. After that, all you require to do is plant your herbs and mulch. Continue mulching your garden.
What is Mulch?
Mulch is a protective covering usually of organic matter such as leaves, manure, straw or peat, placed around plants to fix the roots firmly, prevent the evaporation of moisture and inhibit growth of weeds. Common types of mulch used in Lasagna gardening are grass clippings, chopped up corncobs, sawdust, wood ash, seaweed or kelp. Vegetables like asparagus, tomatoes, beans, cucumbers, garlic, lettuce and potatoes grow very well in such gardens. With a little creativity, you can try anything with Lasagna gardening; even oregano, basil and other herbs.
Gardening is not about the expanse and the range of varieties of plants cultivated but is about the love for greenery, beauty, attention to details and appreciation of the herbs that can grow in the limited space of your balcony, patio or perch. Imagine if the entire stretch of the overgrown urban space would be covered with window-sill gardens, the world would indeed be a much better place to dwell in. We can still transform the world, one windowsill at a time …
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