Caring for your rosemary: cutting and pruning your rosemary
Rosemary is an aromatic herb widely used in cooking to flavor meals but also consumed for its health benefits. In houses and apartments, planting rosemary is easy and requires little maintenance. It grows very well with thyme . Indeed, these aromatic plants need a sunny place and good drainage because they do not like humidity.
Rosemary is a perennial shrub, which survives more than one year. It is therefore an ideal crop for the long term, which will go very well in your garden as well as indoors: in pots , in the vegetable patch or in a planter . Its white, pink or blue flowers will add color and fragrance to your home. You can easily expand your plantation in a few weeks. For this, there are several methods of propagation: cuttings and sowing .
Rosemary propagation
Rosemary sowing
For propagation by sowing, prepare a mixture of potting soil, garden soil and gravel or pebbles that you will place in a pot, vegetable patch, or window box. If you sow your rosemary seeds in the garden, drain the ground well beforehand. Sow your seeds then water.
Rosemary cuttings
Material :
- a pruner
- substrate: mix of potting soil and sand
- clay balls
- a bottle
- scissors or cutter
- a pot
Or
- shears
- a glass of water
- a mixture of potting soil and sand
- a pot
Collect twigs
The cuttings will be done in the spring, during flowering. First step to prepare your cuttings: take a stem of the year using secateurs. This can be a secondary shoot on the main branch in the case of a heel cutting, or the head of a stem in the case of a head cutting. Then, remove the leaves at the base to allow the rosemary to root. Finally, cut the head of the twig so as to obtain a cutting of at least 10cm.
Two methods for cutting rosemary in just a few steps!
1. The muffled cutting method: the steps to follow
- In a pot, mix substrate composed of potting soil and sand with a layer of clay pebbles so that the soil is well drained. Indeed, rosemary does not like humidity, so avoid excess water.
- Using a cutter or a pair of scissors, cut a plastic bottle in half. Keep the part with the cork.
- Plant the stems in the soil you have prepared and water.
- Then, cover these plants with the bottle. Ventilate regularly by removing the cap and then replacing it. You can remove the cap after 3 weeks. During this time, be sure to keep the soil moist.
- Place your plants buried in full sun, outside in your garden or indoors in a well-lit location such as the balcony or near the window.
- Moisten the soil for another month and then stop watering. The rosemary will then have taken root enough to survive the winter. You can also apply this method in a vegetable garden or in a planter.
2. Water cuttings method
- Place your cut and prepared stalks in a glass of water.
- Change the water every day for 2 weeks.
- The new roots should then be clearly visible. If not, you can leave the plants in the water for a while longer.
- Plant the stems in a pot filled with a mixture of potting soil and sand.
- Then put it in a cool place. Water lightly when the soil is dry, being careful not to overwater.
- After a month, you will no longer need to water the rosemary, in fact, it grows in dry, poor soil. You can then leave your rosemary plantation in a pot or cultivate it in a vegetable patch, in a window box and in your garden.
How to prune your rosemary?
Trimming your plants will strengthen them and renew their foliage . You will be able to give the shape you want to your rosemary: in a hedge or in a ball while helping it to renew its leaves for a better harvest. First, in early spring, cut dead branches from the shrub frequently. Indeed, pruning rosemary is done in spring or autumn during flowering. To do this, equip yourself with pruning shears to prune the still green branches of the rosemary so that it can branch out and regrow. If you cut branches that are already dry, the rosemary will not be able to grow back.
