Balcony Herb Gardening

30/07/2022

By Matthew Koehorst If you live in an urban center, chances are you don’t have too much space available for gardening. However, there is still a lot of potential to keep your fingers green and produce a supplementary amount of vegetables to support your fresh vegetable requirements. To garden su...

12/07/2022

It's amazing what's floating around out there, wafting in the breeze. In one of the troughs I found these Stinging Nettles popping up, yet no plants within hundreds of metres. I'm going to harvest them (with gloves!) when they get about 10cms tall and use them in an infusion with breakfast. They have lots of wonderful benefits! Our Wild Rocket is a constant in this trough and I love it with lunchtime salads. https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/stinging-nettle

09/06/2022

How wonderful to sit out on a summer’s evening, lean over and pluck the garnish for your sundowner from your own edible gin garden. Glyn French of Flowstone Gin has some lovely suggestions Beauty enhances every human experience. When it comes to cocktails, garnishes add real visual appeal. They ca...

13/04/2022

If you don't have a balcony ... ;-)

The system fits on a countertop and tailors care to the plants that are being grown

16/02/2022

Become part of a thousand year old tradition from your balcony.

From the cavernous shops in Souq El Blat, herbalists share the rich and fascinating history of their proud and ancient trade – and their fears that it could disappear

06/01/2022

Peppers on the balcony herb garden at last! 🥳

21/12/2021

Thyme and oregano possess an anti-cancer compound that suppresses tumor development, but adding more to your tomato sauce isn't enough to gain significant benefit. The key to unlocking the power of these plants is in amplifying the amount of the compound created or synthesizing the compound for drug...

10/12/2021

This is where should all be going ...

Ben Getz (Managing Director of Urban Harvest Edible Gardens) walks you through the one of a kind Magen David (Star of David) shaped food garden he designed f...

30/11/2021

Is this the future of urban living?

21/11/2021

The extension of my original concept ... moving into the future!

Home to the majority of the global human population, urban areas make an outsized contribution to carbon emissions. What can they do to reach net zero by the middle of the century?

16/10/2021

Some excellent insights and a relaxingly beautiful presentation! Some foraging from our walks: nasturtiums, fennel, num nums ... Natal Plum, Cape Gooseberries, stinging nettles, mulberries, sour figs ... remember to consult your local herbal medical practitioner before using herbs for your own treatment.

16/09/2021

The world is catching with us! ;-)

The garden kit concept supports a hydroponic garden complete with solar panels, charging ports, a workstation and more

30/08/2021

The world is catching up on our ideas at last!

24/06/2021

I've had to cut back on growing on my balcony because of the winter season, but also through the invasion of a destructive baboon that has ripped up plants and broken pots. On the upper balcony where I only grow cacti because of the strength of the winds, I have a regular supply of Wild Rocket which self-seeds. A week ago I noticed a new comer and now have confirmed that a Stinging Nettle likes the trough and has taken well. We use Stinging Nettle as a healthy lunchtime infusion, boiling up 50 grams in water and then keeping it the 'fridge. Both are so healthy ... https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/stinging-nettle https://wellbii.online/8-health-benefits-of-wild-rocket-leaves/

26/05/2021

Have some fun with your balcony herbs!

14/02/2021

Stunning illustrations!

Isabel Mischka – Cucurbita pepo ‘Styriaca’ Cucurbitaceae family Illustration has been a vital component of communicating botanical information for hundreds of years. It is also a beautifully accessible way of illuminating and recording the natural world around us whilst exploring and better un...

07/02/2021

What would the world be like without flowers?

Watch a garden grow in this beautifully illustrated animation with a macro view.

26/01/2021

💙Beautiful Borage💙

The whole plant has a cucumber odor and flavor.  Its bright blue star-shapped flowers are a favorite of honey bees. 
Borage symbolizes courage and power.

Both Roman and Celtic warriors used Borage to give them courage in battle

Borage flowers and leaves are used for fever, cough, and depression. Borage is also used for a hormone problem called adrenal insufficiency, for "blood purification," to increase urine flow, to prevent inflammation of the lungs, as a sedative, and to promote sweating.

According to Greek physician Dioscorides and the Roman scholar Pliny, Starflower was the mysterious plant Homer called “nepenthe”, which would “quiet all pain and strife and bring forgetfulness to every ill”.

In history, Starflower was used in spiritual rituals to bring peace to the home and tranquillity in the family.

21/10/2020

Did you also grow avocado pears from scratch like this when you were a kid? ;-) I know they're not herbs but avocados (we eat every day in season) are delicious in lunch time salads and are wonderfully healthy. They take many, many years to get to produce fruit, but hey! at least they will be here when I'm gone, like the other trees I've planted.

29/09/2020

These 10 antiviral herbs are often used to help people stay healthy, minimize symptoms, and shorten the duration of illnesses at home.

14/09/2020

I've cleaned out some pots and added a trough of different Thymes, also a Vietnamese Coriander! I decided to just keep cacti on the top balcony because of the wind so those have been put in properly and I harvested the Wild Rocket that self-seeded for lunch! I use my coffee grounds for compost with torn up filter papers. The balcony bin with veggie cuttings is another long term project which goes to a large bin in the garage downstairs. Can't wait for summer!

03/09/2020

The new, new in urban living.

08/07/2020

Oh Hellooo Potato Bag!
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06/07/2020

Another one of my essential reference books.

04/07/2020

We've been collecting vegetable kitchen cuttings for a while now and saving them in a 10-litre plastic tub that has a nice cotton cover with an elasticised hem for easy access. I finally got to use a bin in the garage for the final composting. Mix in some nice oak or other leaves which form good mulch, coffee grounds and even the paper filters and you can buy a small bag of compost to get it going. Comfrey, yarrow and chamomile are excellent herbs to speed the process. Use twigs to aerate and don't let it get too squishy! Thanks to Jekka McVicar's "New Book of Herbs" for the photo.

02/07/2020

For an elegant Balcony Herb Garden ... ;-)

29/06/2020

I like this concept, as do I pavement orange trees in Spain and people in cities who grow vegetables instead of lawn in the area in front of their houses for the homeless.

28/06/2020

The flowers are deliciously spicy and colourful in salads and now they're beginning to come back into season on the slopes of gardens and mountainside plots in Simon's Town! They seem to love growing on a slope. 😊

🍀The Humble Nasturtium🍀
Nasturtium in a vegetable garden acts as a trap crop. When you see aphids on the nasturtium, you simply have to pull it out and destroy it, nipping the infestation in the bud.
Both the leaves and petals of the nasturtium plant are packed with nutrition, containing high levels of vitamin C. It has the ability to improve the immune system, tackling sore throats, coughs, and colds, as well as bacterial and fungal infections.

These plants also contain high amounts of manganese, iron, flavonoids, and beta carotene.

Studies have shown that the leaves also have antibiotic properties, and suggest that they are the most effective prior to flowering

22/06/2020

From Jekka McVicar's wonderful New Book of Herbs.

If there's one thing we all need to do now, it's to RELAX! 🤓

Herbs like lavender, chamomile, rosemary, lemon balm and eau-de-cologne mint were used by Greek physician Theophrastus thousands of years ago and now we know that the fragrance molecules released by warm water travel directly to the brain and have an immediate effect of calming our emotions.

The easiest is to crush fresh herbs in your hands and hang them in a net bag under the hot water tap as you fill your bath.

You can also try relaxed deeper breaths than normal with a warm cloth soaked in mint over your closed eyes to create a space all your own and imagine yourself in an ancient Turkish Hamman or Roman steam room ... sigh! 😊

16/06/2020

For thousands of years, herbs have been a source of treatment for many medical conditions and one of the easiest to use is Aloe Vera for skin burns. Slice a small section, apply directly onto the burn and allow to dry. Of course if in doubt, always consult a qualified medical practitioner.

01/06/2020

One of the simple pleasures of growing herbs is the scent when picking them for culinary use like pesto or salads.

When we had a small retail shop we made our own herbal infused olive oil.

Apart from giving the oils and vinegars a delicate taste and aroma, there's also a certain alchemical mystique to having a bottle of oil infused with rosemary and thyme floating in a stylish bottle on the lunchtime table.

Our annual olive crop, currently sitting in brine is almost ready for bottling and this year I'm going to add rosemary, sage, thyme and basil to a few bottles to give them that extra little taste. Experiment and enjoy!

26/05/2020

In my bookholder this week from Jekka MacVicker's wonderful book - a herb we all need desperately these days: Chamomile, the flowers of which are used to make a calming infusion for insomnia and stress. An ancient herb which was also used for lawns. I've had the good fortune to have walked barefoot and lain down on one looking up at the beautiful blue Western Cape sky at Babylonstoren. Bliss! https://babylonstoren.com/

22/05/2020

One of the more frequent questions we get is “Do I need the stand/trolley?” And the answer is no! Most of our buyers purchase them because it makes the garden waist level and if you need to move your pod around, it will need to be on a trolley. But if you’re happy to have it on the ground, it’s absolutely perfect 👍🏼

14/05/2020

On my desk stand, this week is Fennel - Apiacea. It's been a culinary herb for thousands of years and my partner Elinor makes a delicious pesto with a little fennel as one of the ingredients. The dried seeds can be found in restaurants serving traditional Indian food to help in digestion and sweetening the breath! ;-) These lovely Fennel plants were the result of self-seeding as are the delicious Rocket which was in our lunchtime salad along with a few sprigs of Fennel. Yum! I'm also finally putting the bottoms of celery in water and taraaa .... shoots have appeared! Hopefully not too many weeks before we can harvest.

14/05/2020

For me, and many traditional healers and mystics, herbs are far more than just plants but also embody a wealth of archetypal emotional energy which can harmonise with our own physical beings as a healing medium.

Stylised herbal including plants with faces and dragon-like roots, in addition to more naturalistic depictions.

29/04/2020

My perennial Basil is still flowering and attracting the local bees!

Trees, shrubs and woody vines are among the top food sources for honey bees in urban environments, according to an international team of researchers. By using honey bees housed in rooftop apiaries in Philadelphia, the researchers identified the plant species from which the honey bees collected most....

29/04/2020

Some inspiration for growing your Northern Hemisphere Spring herb garden .. my fennel and rocket has self-seeded and is growing nicely! The Basil is still flowering and attracting bees and our resident wasp every day.

We can grow a rainbow, says David Wheeler

27/04/2020

In my bookholder this week from Jekka MacVicker's wonderful book; a North American Indian herb - Echinacea. It was used originally by the First Peoples and probably still is, a trusted herb in fighting infections and boosting the immune system. We used to grow it in large pots but our climate didn't really suit it. I still use the herbal remedy from Dr Vogel though.

20/04/2020

This week's herb on my desk bookstand is Borage, Starflower. Borago officinalis ...Legend has it that Roman soldiers and Crusaders used the flowers to boost their courage before going into battle. I don't have any now, but we used to grow them in large pots when we were making natural dog food. With other herbs, they would go into the mix. The intense blue star-shaped flowers have an oily, piquant taste and look wonderful sprinkled over a green salad, or frozen in an ice cube for your G&T! 🍸🎉🎊

18/04/2020