The Top Ten Herbs For Indoor Herb Gardens

Oct 27th, 2009 by tommy

With winter fast approaching, many gardeners are looking to increase their indoor plant populations. Herbs are a great option for indoor gardens. Well, maybe not a garden in the traditional sense, but a collection of potted plants.

If you read my previous post on growing basil indoors, you’ll already know that many herbs can be grown indoors. Plus, in that post I gave some tips on how to grow basil that can be applied to many other herb species. If you have time please use the links below to read the growing basil post as well as a post on growing an indoor herb garden.

Indoor Basil Growing

Indoor Herb Garden

As a quick review, herbs grown indoors can be challenging and rewarding. Here are a few brief thoughts:

You must provide as much natural light as possible or use some form of supplemental lighting such as grow lights.
Herbs grown indoors will be more susceptible to damage from over watering. These range from root rot to fungus gnat damage.
Fertilizers should be utilized on herbs grown indoors. Many of the potting mixes available simply do not have the nutrient holding capacity of garden soil. Constant, light additions are always better indoors than one time bolus feeds of fertilizers.
Growing herbs indoors requires warmth. While this may seem like common sense, the temperatures of our homes during the winter are often lower than 70 degrees Fahrenheit. This will not be detrimental to your herbs. However, if you can provide stable temperatures over 70, your herbs will produce more usable material.

Defining a top ten list of herbs for indoor gardening can be a bit tricky. I’ve basically taken into account the ease of growth for my list. You may have others you wish to try, but this list will provide you with a good place to start. I’ve also identified each herb with a propagation method that is best suited to the particular species for indoor growing (seed or plant) and I’ll explain possible sources below.

The Top 10 Herbs For An Indoor Herb Garden

Basil – seed
Mints – plants
Chives – seed or plants
Oregano – seed
Sage – seed or plants
Thyme – seed or plants
Dill – seed
Cilantro – seed
Parsley – seed or plants
Lavender – plants

Seeds for your indoor herb garden can be found at most garden centers or from several online vendors. You can do a search at Google for “herb seeds” and you will be presented with an overwhelming array of sources.

For purchasing plants, I suggest you first check your garden center as they often grow herbs year-round in their greenhouses. Like seeds, a search online will also yield a lot of resources. If you currently grow herbs outside your home, you can dig a portion of the plants for indoor transplanting. This works best for those listed as plant options in the list above.

Don’t get discouraged if you try growing herbs indoors and the results are less than perfect. You can focus your future efforts on only those that you have success with and later move on to some of the less hardy herbs.

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Happy Gardening!

Recommended Reading: Earl Mindell’s New Herb Bible: A complete update of the bestselling guide to new and traditional herbal remedies