The Kitchen Garden Novice Evaluates

It's been ninety days since this Kitchen Garden Novice began her experiment in cultivation. Perhaps it is time to review. Here, in no particular order, are ten things I've learned about kitchen herb gardening.

Gleaning is a mercy pitch from the Universe. When I was a child, I was a terrible athlete. I was the kid everyone gave four strikes when she got up to bat. Embarrassing, huh? But if you're that kid, and you manage to connect with a hit, it no longer matters that it was on the fourth strike. If you have to glean your rosemary from the cactus bed, so be it. The Universe is sending you a slow pitch.

Children are a hazard to controlled agronomy. Planting with my granddaughters might have been an inspired notion, but they taught me a bit about scattered seed and divine plans.

Thyme slips by as quickly as...time. You can never have too much thyme. It sprouts in the blink of an eye, and that tender herb is gone just as quickly. Once it is gone, you can never get it back.

Critters like plants. That includes both bugs and puppies. Guard your herbs well. You are not the only foodie in the Universe.

I still have a brown thumb. Forget all of my good intentions and lofty ideals. It kills me that I can over nurture and/or neglect my sprouts to death when Mother Nature produces better produce with no (apparent) effort at all.

Sowing is more fun than nurturing. Sowing is a bit like giving birth. We can see all the promise and hope for our babies and none of the hard work required to raise them to maturity.

Over tending is just as bad as neglect. If you handle young seedlings before they have developed their own inner strength, they will never learn to find the sun on their own.

Harvesting is worth the wait. Nothing tastes as sweet as that first sprig of basil or oregano. The flavor is made that much more savory for the wait.

Introspection is what happens while you wait. I've probably grown more in this process than any of my little plants. (Actually there are those who would say I've gone to seed.)

No one really needs cilantro. Okay, so I threw that one in just to finish with a full ten. But since I've had so little luck cultivating cilantro, let's just say, who needs it, anyway?  True--it's hard to imagine a great salsa without it, but then there's always Whole Foods, right?