I would strongly suggest visiting a bookstore. There are many books that include growing, harvesting, and often, uses for herbs. Go and browse through the books and find one that suites your tastes. They have all the some basic information but the formats and way they are written vary. Find one the works for you. That book will be a valuable resource in care, harvesting, and even planning additions to your garden. If funds are limited, visit your local library and find a book there.

Plus you may wish to use the search function here. Many other new gardeners have asked *very* similar questions. See the responses those folks got as well.

Enjoy!

FataMorgana

Second the search!! If we were to repeat the same info here again, it can get very boring, and confusing. You may also want to buy a book, or go to a library and read about the growing of these herbs, if you don't wish to send any money. At least once a week, a new poster will ask the same questions again.

In addition to the book suggestions, I've found that one can ALSO get a lot of useful information by surfing the web. Many universities and horticulture experts maintain online data bases with lots of helpful information.

The fun part will (hopefully) be in actually conducting your herb gardening "experiment". Some things may do well others may not do well. One can get a great feeling of accomplishment by taking those "experiments" that result in failures, making improvements, and converting to successes. (Actually, I'm still trying to do this for a few herbs in my herb garden.)

None of this is an exact science - some things may do well in one location, having one set of conditions, in one time period, and not do so well in other locations/conditions/time periods. When you get to a point where you want specific opinions on something, then post a question. This site has lots of experts that are more than willing to offer their words of wisdom.

Definitely do some research, in your library, on the internet and on this forum.

I did a search for 'basil' and got over 700 results! If you go to each thread, you'll be an expert on basil in no time. Do the same for the other herbs you're interested in.

Here is a link that might be useful: basil

Thank you all for your help and suggestions!

sweet basil grows with little work at all. :) I personally like to grow in clumps of seedlings. I start out how ever many "clumps" I want of about 6-8 seeds approx 1/2 inch deep. As they break through the soil, I just kind of watch them for a week or so. Then I start to pull the weaker looking seedlings until eventually, close to time to transplant, I have 2 or 3 strong looking seedlings. Then, simply water when the soil gets dry (not too dry though...my sounds like a suction sometimes when I water it...lol) & check for pests on a normal basis. I think i've had 3 bugs total on my plant so far this year. Basil, at least in my location, doesn't seem to attract many bugs at all. They eventually form into massive plants. Mine below is still small. I started the plant below on May 15th (it's actually two plants/seeds). Regarding the other herbs, I don't have much experience with them. Try the search on here like the others mention. A ton of useful info. It's like GardenWiki or something. =)