Sage & Rosemary

I have some concerns about my sage and rosemary. Firstly my sage problem. I have one plant. It produces enough sage for our needs (besides Saltimbocca, we don’t really use sage) but there is no back-up. The need for a back-up has become acute since my chickens have made themselves a (or should I say aNOTHER) dust bath – this one at the base of my sage plant. That area gets very little rain as it’s under eaves. We’ve had a few days of showers and the hens have decided that the nice, dry dust bath in their coop isn’t as good as this new one – in the only dry spot in the garden (I’m going to have to give this area a good drink with the watering can). I can’t imagine the sage (or parsley or oregano or mint) liking the disturbance. Luckily the chooks don’t eat the herbs (way too strong of a taste for my girls) but they can destroy them nonetheless.

My rosemary problem is less of a supply issue (I have multiple plants that provide me plenty of rosemary for my needs) than a frustration issue. I’d like a cluster of rosemary plants but right now have one large one with a couple of small ones under it from last year’s cuttings.

I tried earlier this year to strike some rosemary cuttings with unequivocally disastrous results. I confess that my rosemary propagation is a real hit-and-miss affair, but 100% death was a record even for me. I’ve no idea why they died, but I’m not really that fussed to find out. I have so many branches to prune for new cuttings, I’ll just keep hacking until I get my cluster.

So I took 3 sage cuttings, a few rosemary cuttings, stripped the branches/leaves from the bottom of the cuttings, cut the remaining leaves in half (to minimise evaporation), dipped the cuttings in root hormone and stuck them back in the cutting-pot (with a bit more sand and compost). I couldn’t have done it without the help of my chickens, of course 🙂

After taking the above cuttings, I remembered I had a Warrigal Green plant growing. The cutting survived from the mother plant but, alas, the mother is no more. So time for another cutting.

And here are the cuttings – all sitting happily in their pot on the plant stand where they get plenty of sun and are protected from the worst of the weather (but, on the botttom shelf, not the chickens 😮 ).

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