Hello, I was wondering if anyone could offer some advice. I would like to fill 16 outside terracotta pots with herbs for our school. The children range from toddlers to early teens and we hope to use the pots as an educational tool to foster an interst in herbs as well as improve the environment with colour, scent and hopefully encourage the children to touch and smell the herbs etc. and we intend to use the space for storytelling for the smaller ones. Are there any herbs I should specifically avoid in terms of toxicity/skin rashes etc And can anyone recommend any others aside from the obvious ones such as Lavender/thyme/rosemary/sage- I know Lavender would be fantastic in terms of smell and would attract butterflies but as it would attract bees is it a good idea to plant it? I would be extremely grateful for any advice anyone could offer..
I wouldn’t worry about the bees. They like quite a lot of herbs and they don’t bother you if you don’t bother them.
Some ideas I have pinched from Lesley Bremness’s book on Herbs, where she has a children’s garden herb garden.
It also depends on how big your pots are.
Calendula officinalis has colourful flowers with edible petals.
Primroses Primula vulgaris produce early flowers.
Chamomile Chamaemelum nobile Carpeting herb with flowers for soothing drink suitable for children. You can sweeten with honey.
Spearmint Mentha spicata. Edible.
Sweet cicely Myrrhis odorata Sweet edible seeds and leaves.
Sweet violets Viola odorata Scented flowers for candying
Mullein Verbascum thapsis Its stalks make good rods. It is a biennial and only flowers in the second year.
Lemon balm Melissa officinalis Can make a refreshing soothing tisane
Sunflowers ?
There is a childrens's education page on the Herb Society website. If you click on the Home Page you can navigate from there. There are some projects you can do.
You will find there all the herbs that you can use with children in addition to many fun stories about herbs.
There is not yet a section on growing herbs in pots, but our education officer, Janet, is working on this right now. If you check the earlier postings, you will find on the next page, an item on Herbs in Pots.
You could always email Nick and Rosie on the schools' web site with pictures and information on what you achieve with your pots. We can then include it on the web site so others will learn from your experience.
I think Janet is working on a growing herbs in containers article for the Children's education section currently which will appear sometime in the not too distant future I'm sure. http://www.herbsociety.org.uk/schools/index.htm that page contains a list of factsheets on a number of child friendly herbs and some suggestions of things to do with them.
The one thing you have to watch if the pots are real terracotta, is if placed in a very sunny position then they will dry out very quickly so will need a lot of watering. There's a large number of herbs that will survive in containers aside from the ones you've already mentioned, the child friendliest i.e. those that won't cause any problems if accidentally eaten are Calendula or Pot Marigold, Sweet Violets, Sweet Cicely, Lemon Balm, Lemon Verbena, Oregano, Parsley, Chives, Nasturtium, Wild Strawberries, Catnip, Anise Hyssop, Mint & Heartsease. None of the above herbs are toxic (slightly untrue anything taken in huge doses can be toxic!) all are relatively easy to grow from seed and established plants, and will be fine growing in pots. Try things like orange scented thyme, pineapple sage and chocolate peppermint to give the kids the scent of the herbs with a twist.
Re the bees dilemma, almost all herbs have flowers of one sort or another which will attract bees, butterflies and things like ladybirds and hoverflies. Most herb flowers are nectar gold mines for bees, so if you don't want bees you'd either have to grow the herb and remove the flowers before they come into flower or find some herbs that don't flower, or don't grow them at all! If the children are taught the value of bees and that if they don't bug the bee, the bee won't bug them it can be a very beneficial experience. Especially when it comes down to picking the flowers from most of the herbs above and making a herb salad. May be worthwhile showing them the differences between the honey bee, the bunble bee and wasps (the blighters that are nastier) some people confuse honey bees and hooverflies with wasps as they look similar. I hope that helps, any other questions, feel free to ask or contact me via the herb society :)
This is just to let you all know that we now have a page on the schools' web site on growing herbs in containers. Debs provided some great pictures of pots planted with a number of herbs so we have turned one of her pictures into an exercise for the children to identify the herbs. I got a couple wrong first time!
Go to www.herbsociety.org.uk/schools and follow the link to the Activity Sheet called Growing Herbs in Containers.
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