How to Grow Basil – Everything You Need To Know

 

Basil makes me happy.  It’s amazing how one little plant can create a giddy summertime feel in me. Basil to me, is a little bit of a hot summer day followed by drinks on the porch in the evening.  Basil is present in almost every recipe I make in the summer, from salads to summertime desserts and drinks. I grow as much basil as possible to freeze into pesto for the winter months, so while dealing with the cold short days of winter, opening a jar of pesto give a little bit of the summer warmth back to me. It freezes beautiful and is very versatile: salads, pasta, pizza, and eggs. I use it for any recipe that I want to add some instant summer flavor. I am really excited about summer in case you didn’t notice. This winter was LONG…….

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I originally had problems growing enough basil to season one recipe let alone enough to freeze for the winter. Many of my other warm weather plants grow just fine with some babying now and then but not my basil.  My basil plants would sit in the garden barely growing and then would bolt and flower. After much research, I realized my climate was not adequate for basil (we live in zone 6 with cold nights).

After some research and trial and error I discovered that basil is very easy to grow as long as you give it what it wants, it’s a bit of a tyrant that way. Basil is native to tropical regions from central Africa to Southeast Asia, so to make basil grow you need to mimic these conditions: warmth, moderate humidity and steady temperatures above 60°. So really anyone in the southern United States should do very well growing basil. Unfortunately, I am not in the south so I depend on my greenhouse.

My greenhouse is 10×20 feet and is attached to my barn, and in my greenhouse, I am able to produce enough humidity and steady temperatures to reproduce basil’s natural growing conditions. These growing conditions can be mimicked in other ways as well, semi-enclosed cold frames, row covers or even the inexpensive greenhouses that you find in garden centers. Basil just wants it warm and with no extreme temperatures. Basil can even be grown in a garden bed as long as the nights stay above 50°, although they might not produce enough to make mass quantities of basil, they will produce enough for your summer salads.

Basil in summer recipes are great and if that is what you want basil for, perfect, you can do it. But I am going to tell you how to grow mass quantities of basil, enough basil to make you swoon.

 

 

 

Items Needed

 

 

• Nursery utility flat and clear dome lid-the kind that you can buy from a local garden center. Make sure they have drainage holes in the bottom
• Potting soil preferably organic since you are growing food
• Seed starting heat mat
• Basil seeds at least 2 packets, I prefer Genovese basil but any will work fine. Purple basil and Thai are harder to start from seed and less vigorous.

 

 

Basil is very simple to start from seed. When starting plants from seed, a simple rule of thumb is, the smaller the seed the less it needs to be covered by soil. For example, pea seeds need to be a 1/2 inch deep, tiny basil seeds are the size of a period in a sentence, they lay on the soil with barely a sprinkle of dirt on the top.

 

 

Instructions

 

• Fill nursery flat with soil to about 1/2 inch from the top
• Evenly sprinkle seeds on top of the soil
• Sprinkle soil lightly on top just enough to barely cover the seeds
• Pat gently to make sure all seeds make good contact with soil
• Water soil gently but thoroughly.
• Cover with dome and place tray on the heat mat
• Bright light is the best for germination
• Take the dome off when the basil has sprouted two leaves, at this stage the leaves can easily fry with the cover on.

 

Plants should sprout in 2-7 days depending on temperature. Heat mats are essential for warming the soil enough for the seeds to sprout. Basil prefers the soil to be at least 70° F for germination any cooler and the seeds could rot before germinating.

 

Transplanting Instructions

 

 

Since the seeds are so densely planted they will need to be replanted into their final growing medium. I like using wide shallow planters and when I say shallow I mean at least a foot deep. The planter containers that I am using measures 3X3 and a foot deep. This allows more area for planting and enough soil for healthy roots. Basil starts are very tough and don’t mind their roots disturbed.

• When the basil develops the first set of true leaves and is about an inch tall it is time to transplant. True leaves are the leaves that grow after the first set, confusing right?
• Fill your container full of organic potting soil (Organic practices are best when growing food).
• Separate a clump of basil and gently pull it away from the rest of the basil starts. The roots will be intertwined but that’s okay just gently tease them apart with your fingers.
• At this point, you can individually pull each plant apart or pull into small clumps and plant about 3-4 inches apart in staggered rows. if planting individual plants plant ever 1 inch in staggered rows. I plant in clumps usually, It is a bit time consuming to plant each individual basil start and both methods produce wonderful basil.
• Gently water and place in a warm sunny location.
• Every 3 weeks feed a gentle solution of diluted fish emulsion.

 

After the basil is about 8 inches high or has at least 3 branches I often snip the topmost leaves for meals. You pinch off the stem with the top 3-4 leaves. This allows the side leaves and branches to grow and this makes your basil plant bushier. Eventually, your plants will be about 1-2 feet tall, depending on variety.  At this point, I harvest about a foot of basil. I cut to the middle of the plant right above a set of leaves where two new branches are just waiting to grow. I am able to cut the plant down about two times before the stems are woody and the plant loses vitality. When this happens I pull up the plant and start over.