Not only are we moving our furniture and belongings, but we are moving an entire garden!  All the medicinal plants (save for a few annuals) are heading to the new homestead.  My friend, Deb, taught me how to transplant the herbs successfully when she gifted me with a few of them last year.  It’s pretty easy and only requires that it is done fairly quickly!

1. Place the shovel next to the plant and lodge it as deeply as you can and gently work it up to dislodge the roots.  This may take a few times.  When sufficiently loosened lift the plant into a waiting 5 gallon bucket or pot with a drainage hole.

2. Add good soil around it to fill in the holes and water well.

3.  Transplant within 24 hours preferably.  You want the plant to hardly miss a beat.  Into the truck the plants went the other night and yesterday morning we took them over to the new homestead.

4.  When you get to your new location dig a hole for the plant.  Put a little compost in the bottom of the hole and place the plant into it surrounding it with good soil (from the pot you brought it over in would be good) and water well.

5.  Now if I’d had more room in the truck I would have brought over a bunch of composted straw.  I will do that this week and nestle it all around the bases of the new plants to give a light feeding and protection.  It is a blanket of sorts.

You can cut the plants down if they are overgrown.  I let the vigorous annuals stay full sized because I want them to drop seeds.

This new garden is much smaller than the quarter acre I am used to here.  But there is unlimited potential for new gardens around the ten acres.  The fenced garden is 600 square feet and consists presently of four foot weeds.  I pulled weeds along the edges and planted my plants.  The middle is for another day.  My idea is that the new garden will be surrounded along the edges by my medicinal and culinary herbs as well as berries and perennials.  This will deter pests but will invite in honeybees, butterflies, and birds.  It will be a beautiful ring around the garden.  The trick will be keeping these crazy herbs in one spot!  They do love to jump and grow all over!