Gardening & Landscaping
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
starting herbs indoors..
Is it too early for me to start my herbs indoors? I am planting chives, basil, sage and mint. Zone 4.
I am also starting Marigold indoors from seeds. Any suggestion on when to start them? It says 45-60 days until bloom - so I am thinking March so they are blooming when I transplant to my outdoor garden?
Sorry for the silly questions! I am new to gardening 
Re: starting herbs indoors..
It's waaaaayyy to early for you to start those herbs. Google: Last Average Frost Date Your City, Your State.
You should be able to find your last average frost date & then count back from there.
My last average frost date, in Zone 7, is April 15ish (but summer veg aren't going out until May 15th b/c we usually have 1 freak late frost). My planting dates are in my blog (I think 2-3 posts ago).
Personally, herbs do 1000x better for me outside than inside, so my advice is based on that. In theory you could start the herbs now & just keep inside until it's warm enough, but you'll need a window that gets a ton of sun.
Ok, thanks for your help! I think I am just getting antsy
I had heard herbs were slow growers, so I thought they'd need quite a jump start before going outdoors.
Thanks again!
The woody ones like rosemary & thyme are, but the herbacious ones have never been slow for me...once they are outside. If I start them too early indoors, they get leggy even with a grow light. Def. start them indoors, but count back the number of weeks from your frost date.
For the basil, just make sure to pick often when it's just starting out. Every time you pinch off a pair of leaves, the stem forks. Thus, the more pairs you pinch off, the bushier your basil.
Good to know kastle!