Supermarket pots of herbs / basil

[6rainbow]

I love cooking and use fresh herbs especially basil, and I try to use them Carefully so the plants last but once I've picked leaves they seem to die quite quickly. I usually have two pots of basil so I can rotate them and let them grow.

Has anyone cracked how to keep them alive ?

I think planting them in a new pot with compost would help no end.

I repot them and they grow beautifully. I even managed to grow on some microherbs, chervil and shiso.

If you put a few sprigs in a glass of water they root in no time. Then just put in a pot with compost and they're off...

The basil plants from the supermarket are too tightly packed in their pots so they go through the nutrients in their compost really quickly. If you keep them alive for more than about 2 weeks you are doing really well.

If you get some potting on compost and a series of smallish pots (those square ones in windowsill herb planters are a good size, funnily enough) then buy a big healthy-looking pot, you can water well so the compost comes apart easily and split the pot into about 4 pieces and plant each one separately into a new pot. It will look a bit sparse for a few days but will thicken up. When you take leaves for cooking, pinch out the leaves to a point where there are two good healthy leaves/shoots ready to flourish and they will get bushier quickly.

Alternatively, get a wide, shallow pot and do the same trick of splitting the supermarket pot and planting the bits with some space around them and new compost but in the same pot. This looks really nice if you've got a wide windowsill.

Always water from the bottom, so they need to be in a tray or saucer.

I haven't done this for ages but it's made me want to - off to buy some this afternoon!

Basil also doesn't like being next to other herbs. Made a massive difference to ours when we kept them apart.

Yes

I have Cole and Mason triple herb planters. 20 on amazon.

Or replant in bigger pots of compost and look after like a plant.

There are many seeds in a pot so they get pot bound in supermarket pots very quickly.

Last year 4 herb pots lasted me all summer replanted. This year I'm trying the Cole and Mason triple herb planters too.