Rosemary is an attractive perennial shrub with fragrant leaves. It’s also a popular culinary herb with a wonderful aroma and piney taste which goes well with meat, soups, and potatoes. Learn how to plant, grow, prune, and harvest rosemary the right way!
Rosemary (Salvia rosmarinus) is a compact small to medium-sized woody shrub; there’s also a trailing variety. This shrubby herb is a type of sage, and grows well with other Mediterranean herbs, such as lavender and thyme. It has lovely blue flowers as well, attracting pollinators!
Drought-tolerant, rosemary grows best in warm areas, similar to its native shores of the Mediterranean Sea. In these conditions, rosemary can grow into a shrub 5 to 10 feet in height. In fact, rosemary grows so vigorously in ideal conditions that it needs a yearly pruning to keep it bushy.
This herb can be grown in the ground or in a pot. If you live in Zones 7 and warmer, it grows easily as a perennial evergreen shrub that lives for many years. Rosemary is hardy down to 15 to 23°F (-10 to -5°C) so it may need winter protection. In colder areas, rosemary should be grown in a pot and brought indoors for the winter.
When growing rosemary as a culinary herb, it’s best to harvest in the spring and summer when it’s actively putting on new growth. Rosemary grows as a compact woody shrub. While all the leaves are technically edible, we usually only eat the tender leaves that form at the tips of new branches.
For more information on how to grow rosemary click the following hyperlink to Farmers Almanac Rosemary.
For other resources please click on Gardening Know How's Rosemary link.
Description: Rosemary is an essential ingredient for holiday turkeys, but it adds wonderful flavor to meats, other poultry and vegetables too. Fragrant leaves flavor meats, poultry and potatoes. It also makes a good addition to potpourris. Start seed early indoors. Plants tolerate light frost; set outside early. Perennial. Zones 7-10.
Description: Cooks Garden Favorite. One of the most fragrant of all. Very easy to grow Arp is a beautiful rosemary, on the taller side of varieties at 48", and is said to have some of the strongest fragrance with the best cold tolerance and widest adaptability range. A great variety for first-time rosemary gardeners. Perennial in zones 7-9.
Description: Cooks Garden Favorite. Glossy green leaves, bright blue flower, and a strong upright habit. One of the tallest rosemary available at 60" in height, it also boasts unique bright glossy leaves and blue flowers.
Description: The stems are sturdy enough to be used as skewers for shish kabob, and while cooking, your grilled items are infused with the particularly appealing rosemary flavor of this variety. For gardeners who like to cook out. Rosemary Barbeque quickly grows to form an upright evergreen plant with aromatic needle-like foliage. It produces clear blue flowers that soon cover the plant and contrast nicely with the dark green foliage. Barbeque is perennial in zones 8 to 11 and can be grown in containers in cooler areas.
Description: Unlike the usually upright habit of most rosemary, Prostrate has a beautiful draping, vining habit that turns your favorite patio planter, hanging basket or window box into an instant herb garden. Also grand as a groundcover in the culinary or rock garden. Trailing form works well as a ground cover or in hanging baskets
