Lucky us, we had a new volunteer today! She jumped right in deadheading basil flowers, trimming back fennel, etc and is so interested in learning more about growing and using herbs. The magenta rock rose, red mallow and sunflower goldeneye are blooming profusely. We also planted more fall cool weather herbs. Edible: curly and flat leaf parsley plus chamomile. Also Creeping Jenny, aka moneywort due to round golden-green leaves, which is a traditional herbal tea remedy. Nonedible herbs we planted: pigeonberry as the red berries were historically used as rouge cosmetic and the berries provide food for birds. AHS educates on all function of herbs: both edible and nonedible uses for household, skincare, perfume, insect repellants; and both historical traditions and modern research.
Today we finished the new bed edging stonework to enclose vetiver & comfrey. Last week when I was away, the city garden staff had brought stones and our new regular volunteer who isn't even a member of AHS, removed grass & soil and laid the front stones - she is amazing! Today I dug to lay the side stones and leveled all the soil in the bed. So much has changed being away for a week - all the huge purple perilla near the herb garden entrance sign blossomed, all the red verbena that had gone to seed has reblossomed after the rain, lavender is in bloom. We cut back a lot of herbs at the end of their summer growing season, but started planting some of our fall cool weather herbs.
This is wonderful Karla! Thank you so much for this!