The idea for a herb spiral is quite simple. Creating a raised circular area for your herbs artificially adds different habitats to your growing area.The raised shape allows the water to drain well creating the different dampness areas in the spiral and the position of everything relative to the sun and each other creates different shade conditions. Low down on the north side is wet and shaded high up on the south side dry and sunny. The idea for using wine bottles to create the shape came from two places. The nice lady up the road who uses them to line her paths and the brilliant book by Dick and James Strawbridge Practical Self Sufficiency.
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Arrange bottles in the shape you want.
Place cardboard down as a biodegradable mulch to suppress weed growth.
Fill shape with soil/compost We dug ours out from the pig enclosure. Ready manured!! If you have money, you could always buy it from the shops, of which there are many!
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| South side-Rosemary, Sage, Chamomile,Thyme |
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| North-Tarragon, Wild Garlic, sorrel |
In there there is also some lemon balm, peppermint, flat and curly parsley and chives all in the "middle" areas
A month and a half on. Everything is coming along. The wild garlic has died back so we're waiting till next year to see if they're up to the winter temperatures. We've added pot marigolds, garlic and coriander (Which is still quite small so you can't see it here) Yet again parsley is not performing for us. It was the same in England. Parsley seems to be a bit of a blind spot in the Powell veg arsenal. Ideas on a postcard!!
