Working in the HERB GARDEN - The Wonders of BORAGE!
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- čas přidán 13. 09. 2024
- Today I'm working in the Herb Garden! The wonders of BORAGE are amazing! It's a medicinal herb that's great for the garden -- a plant that makes wonderful fertilizer and compost, gradually improving your soil and feeding your vegetables and flowers, while also bringing you great health benefits and a delicious cucumber-like flavor.
It's believed that borage is good for fighting off cold symptoms, fevers, inflammation, breathing issues, adrenal fatigue, and depression. In fact, borage is known to stimulate the production of adrenaline, giving some people a feeling of 'euphoria' or courage. I consider borage an encouraging herb or an herb for well-being, since that is how I feel when I eat it or drink it as a tea.
Borage is an extremely sturdy plant that readily self-sows, so every year dozens of seedlings will pop up for you, ready to transplant all around your gardening space. Come join me as I dig up the borage seedlings, careful not to damage their long taproots, and transplant them all over my garden!
Hi, I'm Kim, and this is Olive City Oasis (formerly, Olive City Homestead), my 2.5 acre property here in far northern California, Zone 9B.
I like to emphasize easy gardening anyone can do - even brand-new beginners!
On my channel, I enjoy sharing my fruit trees, my veggie and herb gardens, perennial flowers, garden-to-table recipes, and simple living garden ideas. As a senior, solo, frugal gardener, I keep things down-to-earth, casual, and encouraging. I also like to talk about self-care through gardening because I believe experiencing nature is extremely important to our physical, mental, and emotional well-being.
If any of this sounds interesting to you, you can subscribe by clicking this link!
www.youtube.co...
You can also send me a private message here: kim@olivecityoasis.com
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Here are a few OTHER VIDEOS I think you might enjoy:
~Make Rosella JAM, Rosella-Lemon SCONES, & More! SO EASY to Grow!~
• Make ROSELLA JAM, Rose...
Red Roselle Hibiscus has a unique, tangy, citrusy flavor, like a rhubarb-lime mix, and there are so many great ways to USE it! Especially Rosella JAM! In this video, I share with you how to make an easy, delicious jam with Rosella, as well as advice for making wonderful Rosella-Lemon Scones!
~~Come See My FRUIT TREES! ~ Plant Your Own FRUIT ORCHARD!~~ • Come See My Fruit Tree...
Does the thought of stepping outside to harvest delicious, healthy fruit from your own trees sound intriguing? Because YOU CAN DO IT! Why not start this year?!?! You'll be enjoying your favorite fruits sooner than you think. Come take a look at a few of the beautiful trees I'm growing!
~~TIME for a GARDEN PROJECT! What is a MEDLAR TREE?~~
• Time for a GARDEN PROJ...
In this video, I transform a boring corner of land into a simple but pretty landscaped area that welcomes me as I drive up my driveway and park. Using inexpensive cement blocks, free, soil-nurturing woodchips, and a few flower seedlings, I quickly remake a small, neglected area into something beautiful. It's a place I can sit and relax any time I need a little peace and quiet - and you can do something like this, too!
**Thanks for joining me today!**
Let me know in the comments below if there is a particular herb you love to grow or use in your cooking or health care. I think we can all learn from each other, so I'd love to hear from you. Also, if there's an herb you'd like me to feature in the upcoming months, be sure to mention it in a comment, and I will do my best to make a video on it!
Let Nature Heal You, Friends!
Kim
***Music Credits*** Music: Aero Musician: Gabriel URL: icons8.com/music
**Photo Credit** Right Borage Photo in Thumbnail/3rd Still Photo in Video -
by Lucy Kral on Unsplash
I have planted borage in every cloth pot that has tomato plants. This is my first time using it! I had a hard time with pollination last summer, so I am excited to see more bees.
Their beautiful blue blossoms definitely bring in the bees! 🐝🐝🐝 And you're adding nitrogen to your soil at the same time! 😎 Thanks for your comment, and I wish you a huge tomato harvest this summer! 🍅🍅🍅
Borage is a great herb & love your "girls." Oddly enough, many gardeners have never heard of Borage!
You're right! Borage is undeserved unknown! Maybe because it's a bit prickly, but it's so beautiful, useful, and delicious, it's worth getting "stuck" a few times. ☺️ Thanks for the comment, Paula!
I had a great time just watching you in your garden and telling us all the great tidbits about Borage! So relaxing + natural. You are a genuine gem. Thank you for ‘sparking joy’ in me. 😌
Thank you so much, Christine, for your sweet comment! 😊 I really appreciate your kind feedback. I do love growing borage, and this fall it's really going crazy volunteering all over my garden! ☺️
Thanks for the vide! I LOVE Borage. I use it for soil rehab and for the bees who adore it. Increases bee activity for other flowers and plants relying on them for pollination. I get lots of flowers but they live about 4-5 months so I use the leaves for other plants and then plant other stuff. Sometimes I'll grow slower growing plants who like shade around them and they do really well. I collect the seeds as well to use again and they do self sow everywhere including in cracked pavement.
Yes, exactly, borage is amazing! Such a great pollinator plant, and excellent for enriching the soil, as you said. At the moment, I have volunteer borage growing everywhere!
I LOVE your lady chickens! So pleasant to listen to them!
So glad you enjoyed them! I have new chickens now, too. They make wonderful pets. 😊
I started some borage from seed this year for the first time and was looking for some information on how to best utilize it in my garden. Your video is by far the best one I've seen on the benefits of borage. I live in a much cooler climate than you, so I am just starting to put out a few of my frost tender plants. I just wanted to thank you for all the information and inspiration!
Thank you! I'm so glad anything I shared about borage helped you. It's such a great plant and so often overlooked, I thought it deserved a video all to itself. 😊 Best wishes with your borage experimenting and your whole garden this season!
My borage reseeded this year. The spot must be their happy place as I have a large plot of it. Glad you mentioned they can be added to water to make compost tea. I grew happy comfrey from seeds this year. That makes a nice compost tea too. Great to know about borage and tomatoes. The bees are all over them!
Yes, once borage gets going well, it spreads all over. 😁 The beautiful blue blossoms definitely attract a *lot* of bees to the garden! 🐝 Also, makes a great layer under soil if you're building a new bed or starting new pots or grow bags.
You're right - comfrey makes a great compost tea or mulch, too. 👍Thank you so much for your comment, and I'm glad you enjoyed the video! 😊
Awesome my dear friend 👌
Thanks!
Thank you! What a great explanation! I planted some here and there in a raised strawberry bed maybe a couple weeks ago. They are all popping up. The seed packet said planting it with your strawberries would improve yields and flavor of the berries. A little worried they will overshadow my berries though. So many are coming up. I will relocate some to other beds now before they get too big. Thank you! :)
Yes, mine definitely grow big most of the time, so carefully moving some might be a good idea! I'm sure they will help your strawberry plants though, and I know they're said to improve the flavor of tomatoes, so it's not surprising they'll do the same for strawberries. 😊
Borage is new to me. I will definitely be planting tomatoes this year so I will see if I can find some borage to plant with them. Thanks for the education, Kim!
Baker Creek has seeds - rareseeds.com - and free shipping on all mainland US orders. I definitely prefer the gorgeous blue flowers to the white ones. 😊 Just know that these plants grow big!
And you're quite welcome, Debora! ☺️
Herbs are so great!
I think so, too! 😊
Great video, thank you! This grows wild all over my property, I am super excited to eat and drink and transplant into my veggie garden!
Thanks for your comment! And how wonderful you already have so much borage growing for you! Yes, once it gets started, it spreads easily as its flower seeds drop. It's easy to take out though if it ends up somewhere you don't want it.
However, transplanting it successfully requires getting that whole long taproot, so best to do it when the plant is small. After transplanting, borage can look a little worse for wear, but it usually bounces back and does fine. 😊
Glad you liked the video! Enjoy you young borage salad leaves and your borage tea and smoothies! 😎
First👍. they are pretty flowers, love the color. Thankya for the looksee and info🔥💝
Thank you for watching! Yes, the bright blue color of borage flowers is incredibly beautiful. One of many reasons I love to grow it. 😊
What a great explanation of how and why you should grow borage!
Thank you so much! I'm really glad you enjoyed the video. Have a wonderful week! 😊
Borage sounds so amazing! My husband used to take the supplement for inflammation, he loved it! I really should consider growing it!😊❤❤❤
You should definitely grow some, Juani! It's beautiful and spreads like crazy on its own, as I've discovered, but it's easy to pull out. I want to get it growing wild in my orchard! 😎 Great for the soil, and excellent for pollinators! And yes, the leaves make a great medicinal tea.
Do you recommend seeds or started plants?
@@juanisgarden5356 I never found any starter borage plants, but they grow super easy from seed. 😁 I originally direct sowed them straight into my herb garden. They seeded a few new plants on their own that year, and I transplanted a few of them in the early spring. Since then they've spread all over. 😎
I pull out some to put in new beds and pots, under the soil, along with collard leaves and food scraps, and it works great. 😊 The others I leave in place to build up the soil and look lovely. 💙
They bloom the most and look the best in the early to mid-spring, although I still have some plants looking pretty awesome right now.
I wouldn't sow or put out new young plants at the moment though in my hot climate. Late fall or late winter, where I am (Zone 9B) - fall or early spring elsewhere.
You could grow some in pots now for tea, but their long taproots really don't like transplanting. You *can* do it, but carefully, and only when the plant is small. That's been my experience anyway. 😊 Good luck!
I think I'll wait, since it's hot already..... we're expecting triple digit temperature for next week. Thanks so much for the detailed information!! 😀
Wonderful in depth video! Thank you so much, I have a bunch of borage popping up from an edible flower seed packet I sowed last fall 💜🌱💜
So glad you enjoyed the video. 😊 Yes, borage grows best when it comes up on its own. Transplanting from seedlings or volunteers can work (as most of the ones I did in this video have), but they can also be tricky with borage's long tap roots. Are your plants flowering yet? Some of mine are just about to bloom, and I'm excited to see their pretty blue blossoms! Hoping they'll be flowering in time for my April Garden Tour video! 😊
Also, I just checked out your channel and subscribed. What a fascinating art technique! I've never seen it until now, but I loved the way it looked in the beginning and then the dramatic transformation at the end. Thanks for sharing! 😊
@@OliveCityOasis Thank you so much! 💜🌱 They are not flowering yet, the biggest ones have about 4 inch leaves and are growing quite flat..... There are so many! I'm thinning and feeding the excess to my rabbits and chickens, and I may try to move some of the smaller ones to my tomato beds 😊 Thank you for stopping by! I'm looking forward to your april garden tour!!!
@@Moonsprouts I bet they start shooting up their blossoms soon! My chickens and ducks love borage, too, but usually I use my excess or yellowing leaves to enrich my soil. 😊
@@OliveCityOasis Comments from gardeners located like you guys make me laugh, which is nice in the morning.... Borage flowering in April? I don't even start my indoor seeding till mid-April here, since we have at least two months of hard-slogging till mid-June when things really start to take off. It is 15 June now and my Borage transplants are maybe 2 inches tall and just starting to grow a bunch of new leaves. Well, your comments do provide hope for the season ahead, which is very valuable in itself.
Thank you for sharing an interesting video..... good luck friend
Thanks so much for the comment and the good wishes. 😊
THANK YOU
You're welcome! 😊 So glad you enjoyed the video!
i like this
very good garden
thanks for sharing
Thank you for the kind words. 😊 Just watched one of your painting videos - fascinating work!
I make great sweet iced tea with my pineapple sage leaves, can't wait to try the borage now!
Let me know what you think of it! 😊 And I love my pineapple sage leaves for iced tea, too! The smell alone is heavenly. ☺️
Thanks for the very informational video !!!
Glad you enjoyed it! Thanks for watching! 😊
Wow that is really cool about the borge plants. I will have to check them out. Thanks for sharing this video. Have a blessed day
Yes, borage is SO cool in so many ways! I love what it does for my soil, the pollinators go crazy over it, and the little blue star flowers are very pretty. Glad you enjoyed the video, Renee!
I just started looking up what to do with borage, and many people say to make tea but no one explains exactly how to do that. 🤔
That's another thing that's great about herbal teas - they're very easy to make. 😊
With borage, you first harvest some young leaves - not tiny, but not the big, hairy ones! ☺️ You can use the leaves for tea either fresh or dried, whole or torn in smaller pieces. I always use fresh in the spring and summer. 😊 You can also make tea with the little blue blossoms, but they have an extremely mild flavor, so I stick with the leaves.
You put the leaves in a tea ball or a larger tea strainer basket, and place your borage-filled strainer or ball directly in your cup or teapot. Pour over them hot water that has just come to a boil, and steep for 8-12 minutes.
Steep time is a matter of taste. The longer you steep your herbal tea, the stronger flavor your tea will have. You can test the flavor and just keep steeping if you want a stronger end result.
Once satisfied with the flavor strength (take note for next time!), you can choose to add sweetener to your tea, if you wish, whether honey, sugar, or stevia. (I grow my own stevia, so if I want a slightly sweet tea, I just add a few leaves into the strainer before steeping.)
Sometimes I float a few of the pretty blue blossoms on the top of my tea because it looks so nice, especially if I'm serving it to others. 😊
And that's all there is to it! Making herbal teas is simple, relaxing, and rewarding. It's also fun to experiment with creating your own tea blends. I love mixing Lemon Verbena or Chocolate Mint with Borage - delicious and even more health benefits! Dried tea blends make a great gift, too.
Best wishes for making your own herbal teas - enjoy!
That chicken wants a borage leaf. Sold be good for him.
Yes, the chickens love the borage. ☺️ But I think their favorite treat is winter savory leaves. They're not too picky though. 😊
Thank you so much. I will moat definitely invest in them now.
Great! And you'll only need to plant them once because they self-seed so easily. 😊
Awesome video 💐👍
Thank you. 😊 I appreciate your kind words.
I’ve never heard of this amazing. Great info I’ll have to try this one 👍🏼
Yes, I find more uses for borage all the time, and the flowers are so pretty, too! Thanks for watching and commenting. 😊
Wow, new word for me! Fascinating video Kim, I need some of this when the waves are big! Such exquisite flowers too, just beautiful! 11/10 once again! :)
Yes, I think I'm going to be adding some to my smoothies! I'll take all the mood-boosting energy I can get!
@@OliveCityOasis I'd like to see a video on that! Preparation, effects etc!
I had to take another look at this video now that I have the Borage seeds. I can't wait to grow it and see those pretty purple flowers. Can they be put in pots to stay without putting in beds? I have very limited space in the ground, but I can find a spot if not. That's great that they make great fertilizer and are a great companion plant to tomatoes. So much good information. Thanks my friend!!!
I've never grown borage in containers, Renee, but I'm sure you could. Give it a try! 😊 (And maybe plant one somewhere you want to improve the soil.)
@@OliveCityOasis great idea. Thanks.
1:01 Man..your hens live in a penthouse.
Haha! 😊 Yes, they do! Nothing too good for my girls!
Great comprehensive Borage video. I planted several seeds this March and put out 8-10 transplants which are slowly getting established. I'm looking forward to trying several of the many ways you mentioned of eating them, and in teas. First time I've watched any of your videos, looking forward to many more. Congrats, 288 subscribers and counting..... Oh, by the way, where is "Olive City"....?
Glad you enjoyed the video! I love borage for many reasons, and it's so good for the garden, too. If even half of your plants do well this summer, you'll probably have volunteers in the spring. Mine pops up everywhere now! 😊
The small town I live near in northern California is known as the olive capital of the US, hence my channel name. Thanks for subscribing. I checked out your channel just now and see that we both grow a lot of fruit and herbs - and both like to experiment with plants. ☺️
@@OliveCityOasis Comfrey seems to be the preferred Permaculture deep-rooted nutrient uptake plant but after research I found Borage with many of the same properties, plus it is edible so it was a no-brainer to give it a try. It is slowly getting established and I'm excited if it really takes and is a consistent garden companion.
@@ediblelandscaping1504 Exactly. I tried comfrey, too, but borage grows much better for me here - and has such pretty flowers!
Thank you for such a great video! I just found you while searching for info about Borage. I planted seeds this year, and it's starting to bloom. Lots of great info here. I watched another video that said if you don't pull the plants b4 leaves get dry. the pricklies are vicious, even through gloves. Also, so manybpeople had commented on her post that no plant had ever attracted so many pests. Do you find these things to be true? I grow comfrey already. I'm wondering about making a compost tea with both now. Thanks again!
@nancyspruiell347 Hi, Nancy! 🙋♀️ Glad you enjoyed my Borage video! To answer your questions, I have never had *any* pests at all on my Borage plants! None! In fact, in addition to being a pollinator magnet, borage attracts insects like predatory wasps, hover flies, and lacewings, which all do a great job taking care of actual pests in the garden, like tomato hornworms and cabbage worms. 😊
Now, I've *never* had issues with snails and slugs here, but I've read that borage makes an excellent trap plant for these pests. That might be what some of those commenters you mentioned were talking about... Perhaps they thought the borage was bringing those pests *to* the garden, rather than understanding it was simply drawing pests already present *away* from their other plants. 🤔
Borage definitely does get more prickly the older it gets! 😮😎 My thick gloves have always handled it fine though. 😁 I don't think I'd use it in compost tea - bound to lead to wet, messy gloves!
I like to use old borage in beds and pots over the winter to enrich the soil, burying it under other garden waste, chicken manure, or compost. (Of course, I cut the old borage off at ground level, leaving the roots in place to build up *that* soil.)
One thing I'll say about growing borage that I've learned super well since I made this video is that it spreads on its own like crazy - for me anyway. Mostly, I enjoy this, but where I don't want it to grow, I just pull it out completely, roots and all, the younger the better. I learned to identify those first little leaves very quickly, so I pop them out regularly to keep the borage where I want it. 😊
Hope that helps! Happy Growing!
Great video, I planted borage earlier this year and it's growing like crazy. Because of the prickly leaves, I was hesitant to eat it. Thanks for the info.
I'll be drying mine for tea.
I wonder if you can use them to make borage oil.
Hey, thanks for watching and for your comment. Many people hesitate to use borage due to the 'prickly' factor, so you're not alone there. 😊 I think the young leaves are much less prickly and have the best flavor, and yes, the taste and health benefits of the tea are great.
Borage oil is definitely a wonderful health supplement, but it's made from cold-pressing the seeds of the plant. It would be a difficult process for the home gardener and would require a *lot* of borage. (And unfortunately, from what I've read, infusing borage with a carrier oil doesn't yield the same benefits.)
hello, this is a wonderful video! Would you happen to know if its normal for them to grow/be really flat on the ground? The ones I planted grew quickly and they're about 12 to 14 invhes from one leaf tip to the other side, but they're not growing in height at all. Do they grow upwards at all? I'm really confused about this plant because I've never planted it before!
Hi! So glad you enjoyed the video. 😊 My borage plants have always grown to be 18-36" tall - most are about 24". Sometimes they can lean over with the weight of their flowers, but usually they stand upright strongly.
I've just researched a bit and discovered there is a variety of Borage known as Borago pygmaea - also called Creeping Borage. While the same in all other ways as regular Borage (Borago officinalis), Creeping Borage only grows to about 11in in height. Perhaps this is the variety you're growing?
SOIL I see SOIL !!!
This made me laugh. 😊 I take it your soil is covered in snow at the moment?