Is Basil really an annual?

I have three kinds of basil planted, Sweet, Genovese, and another kind. It's too cold to go look at the tag on the other one. LOL. Because I read everywhere that they are annuals, I planted them in the straw bales I used for my tomatoes. After our first hard frost here and I wanted to remove the bales, I noticed that the basil plants were still going strong and had woody stems. So, I potted them up and put them on my front deck to see what would happen. So far, they are still in good shape and very happy.

Here's a photo of the Genovese:

Basil is definitely an annual if you have frost. My got bitten last week as the temperatures dropped before I have time to throw frost blanket on them.
The parsley and cabbages are going strong, but basil season is over for us until the weather warms up.

Why not experiment and see how long you can keep your plant going?

Well, I'm going to do that. They had already gotten a light frost when I went to dispose of them, but because they were all doing so well I potted them up. The one in the photo I forgot to move from that shelf, and it was sitting there when we got the first hard frost, 10 hours below freezing, and it didn't even lose a leaf. That's why I wondered if it was really an annual.

It will be interesting to see what I still have of these plants come Spring. I have them now up against the outside wall of the house on the front deck. So, they are getting quite a bit of protection there.

Thanks for your input. I'm a newbie at growing herbs but trying to learn.

Karen

When I have my act together, I bring them indoors and put them under grow lights. I have one that has so far survived 25*F temps - it is in a raised bed with sides that come up 1 foot above the soil and is under the remains of my "sacrificial tomatoes" (the sacraficial toms are the ones I grow for the caterpillars - when I find cats on the people food toms, I move them there... I leave those dead toms there all winter so that the cats can finish pupating and become moths). When I lived in zone 9b, I could pot them and put them on the porch and would be able to keep them through most of the winter.

You can take cuttings of your basil and start them in a cup of water indoors, then pot them up and keep them in the window until spring. They might not grow crazy, but you'll be able to get some yummy leaves during the winter and they'll be ready to grow like mad when you plant them out. They don't seem to have too much trouble with transplanting. I DO miss my zone 9!!

Good luck! Have fun!

kmom246,

Me, too - loved zone 9. It is a Zone 8b down in town, but up here 15 miles from nowhere and on the mountain, we can count on it being 5-10 degrees colder here. So, if the low predicted is 42 - I can expect it may well get down to 32-37. But the basil in the pots up against the house are probably getting a lot of extra warmth there. If it looks as if they will cork off there, I'll use your method and take cuttings.

Did your basil plants develop woody stems like a bush? I didn't think annuals got that kind of woody stem.

I have a very small hibiscus that is in a raised bed against the side of the house, and I haven't been covering it for frost. Not a leaf damaged yet - it bloomed the other day.

Thanks,

Karen

My Sweet Dani Lemon Basil got to about 2 ft tall and developed woody stems - and it was the first to keel over when the cold hit - I think it met its demise when the temps were in the low 40*F - I know for certain it didn't make it to freezing. Most of my other basils (that survived the Dog Debacle) made it to the mid- 30*F range before giving up the ghost. One thing good about basil, though - triple digit weather doesn't bother them at all!

I believe the basil I have is common basil.. I had never seen it before... anyhow.

I brought two woody plants inside into my greenhouse.. and have been breaking the flowers off constantly.. It doesn't seem to matter to the plant.. It just keeps putting off more and more flowers. I have taken cuttings and the tiny cuttings still want to flower.

I took cuttings off of my friend's italian basil. The plant had not yet gone woody stemmed.. It did have a few tiny cuttings that wanted to flower/go to seed. But, the cuttings took off much easier.

Wondered if taking cuttings from the basil when it had become a late season/woody plant made the difference. I know that juvenile growth in trees and old growth in trees makes a difference in flowering and fruiting. ( Which is why fruit trees that have been grafted grow fruit sooner ).

If it was the variety of basil that made the one so much easier to propagate from cuttings?

Maybe even the common basil has such a different growth habit... The shorter daylight hours of the time of year and since it's still outside ( although in a greenhouse) it is trying to do it's best to go to seed and insure offspring for another year?

Maybe I should just give in to it's wishes, collect seeds, dry or freeze the leaves for cooking, and just start new plants from seeds in the Spring.

I know all this thinking about basil makes me hungry. Think I better run out and check on it..

Hi, KathyJo :-)

Sometimes some of the basils go to flower before I can harvest them - I cut the flowers off and dry them and trim the plant back fairly harshly (by about 1/2 - leaving at least 6" of plant) and they bounce back with many new leaves. If you weren't interested in the dried flowers, you could just cut them back. It takes them a bit to get back to the "I want to go to seed" stage - during which time you can harvest lots of leaves. At some point in late summer, I give up and take a last harvest and let the basils all go to seed.

By the way, I grew a lot of basils last year as they are something that actually like the desert - I let some in each veggie bed flower on purpose and they drew in polinators by the droves.

Bought 2 basil plants from an herb farm this year.African Blue Basil and Varigated Basil.They told me that these 2 types could be over-wintered indoors.I know the seeds from both plants are sterile.I'm trying the "Blue".Also took cuttings.The Varigated,I just took cuttings.So far,so good,the plants are under lights.Its fun to experiment and cost nothing.The rest of my basils,I grow from my own seeds every year.Edge

As a result of researching this topic, I found reference to people eating basil seed in cooking. Made me say Hmmmmm. Anyway, should your basil go to seed at all, you will probably have "wintersown" volunteers next spring too.

I think most basils are 'tender perennials'---most varieties will survive if they are not hit by frost or other inclement conditions that kill them off...

But since they are sensitive to cold and other weather issues, basils are 'treated as annuals' by most gardeners here in the states (some gardeners with greenhouses or in the warmest climates excepted). That's where there seems to be some confusion about their nature/classification.

Strictly speaking, an 'annual' completes it's life cycle--germination, growth, bloom, and seeding--in one year and then perishes, whether in the greenhouse, a warm climate, or in a less hospitable environment....

I wish I had a greenhouse to winter over mine but I don't so I replant every summer. I can't believe all the different basil seeds that are available now. So many choices!

And so little room ~ lol

A tender perennial only if you prevent it from blooming, reseeding and ending its' own life maybe?

tabasco,

Thank you. That explains much. I was aware of the definition of "annual" and that's where my confusion was coming from as they did not appear to be following the rules for that. I had not seen any annuals develop woody shrub-like stems as these had done.

Mine did get hit by one heavy frost because, thinking they were strictly annuals, I made no effort to protect them. When I found they only lost a few leaves from that and were otherwise still going strong, I dug them up and potted them. They are very happy in their pots on my front deck up against the house.

I've been using heavy-duty frost cloth on many plants that wouldn't make it through even our milder winters without protection. They are all doing great with this. The frost cloth is easy to put on at sunset and take off the next day. Takes about 10 minutes total. The hard part is going out in the morning to take it off while it is still colder outside than I like to be fooling around in. Brrrr! I cheat and wait until about 10:00 am.

podster,

No, I don't think so. I was not very good at getting to the blooms and keeping them picked off this summer. They seemed to bloom incessantly during the hot spell we had in August. At least two of the three did seed with no sign of that affecting their growth or continuing survival. The bigger one is blooming now.


Karen

Karen, is this a special "frost cloth" or just blankets and tarps and plastic bags, like I use..??
jo

I too am interested in the frost cloth... may I ask where you bought it?

I did the blankets, sheets, etc. last winter. This year I decided to try this.

It is purchased stuff and is called frost cloth or sometimes called floating row cover. I saw WeeNel mention it in a post, and she calls it garden fleece. It comes in 4 weights. The heavy stuff like I got protects down to 20 degrees. The reason I have to uncover during the day is that the heavy duty only allows 50% of the light to come through. I got two 100' rolls that are 20' wide.

I put up a sort of PVC lean-to out from the east side of my house. It's about 30' long, 8' wide, and 7' high. I cut and sewed pieces together until it was big enough to cover this area down to the ground, attached it to the PVC against the house and weighted it down with bricks all around. This area has my brugmansias in it, and I'm going to move all the potted plants I've been covering on my deck into it tomorrow and set them among the brugs.

Last night it got down to about 19 deg. here, and it worked perfectly. I am about 10 miles out into the boonies up in the hills, and so it gets about 10 deg. colder here than the predicted low temp for the city itself.

It's best to keep it off the tops of the plants if you can. If your plants are not very high and the area is small, you can use stakes or pieces of rebar in the ground to hold it up. And, of course, it must reach the ground all the way around.

I have seen people here on DG mention using the light weight for row covers over their new veggie plants to keep bugs and critters away until the plants get big enough they don't need the extra protection. I don't have this kind of problem so I haven't tried it for this. Since it comes up to 51' wide and 900' long, I would say that lots of commercial growers use it, too.

Here's where I bought it:
http://www.berryhilldrip.com/RowCover.htm

These folks are the cheapest on the net -- both in cost for the rolls and in shipping. They were also fast in shipping. I spent a couple of hours researching to make sure of the cheapest place.

pod: We must be thinking along the same track. You posted while I was typing this. LOL. = + ))

Karen

Thanks for the info. I tend to be lazy and let someone elses fingers do the typing. Thanks for sharing your research, I will check them out... pod

I always lose mine by about November. I let it start to go to see in October and just let them fall. Next Spring I will have lots of new plants. I usually dry some leaves for winter cooking. Just saw a tip on Food network that freezing it give a better fresh taste. Of course I heard that after I had dried a batch, oh well-freezing it is my plan for next fall. I love Lemon Basil.

I start freezing basil with the first harvest - some to use now and a few bunches for the freezer. I separate the leaves from the stem, wash & drie leave, shake in a baggie with good olive oil in it to coat leaves and then put leaves into a larger baggie where I store the bounty. The small "oiling" bag also goes into the freezer. When I'm ready to go harvest more basil, I bring my baggie out of the freezer - it's thawed and ready to go by the time I have the basil ready for shaking. Lemon basil doesn't seem to hold it's flavor & aroma as well as regular basil this way -- but, to have any basil is wonderful at this time of year! By the end of summer I have several large ziplock bags full of basil in the freezer, with just a moment or two here and there.... mmmm, must be time for some scrambled eggs and basil...

Thanks for that description. I will be sure to try it next season. I think I like the lemon basil because it isn't as strong? I tried it because it was the only one I could find one season and it blends so well with my Greek oregano in my homemade pizza sauce.