Basil

[DutchOmainthestable]

Not sure whether to post it here or in cookery or gardening.
Anyway, I bought a pot of basil in Tesco and it said 'best before' three days hence. So i thought, "Well, it is in a pot, in earth and it will grow." Unfortunately, not so. Within about a week it is beginining to wilt from the bottom up and it is now almost entirely black, about a fortnight after I bought it. I have watered it once by plunging it in the rain butt and waiting till it stopped bubbling.

Has anybody any ideas about: why you can't keep basil on the window cill in a pot or what I have done wrong to keep it alive. The window is east facing and gets the very early morning sun, but not in winter.

Basil is very hard to keep/maintain in British weather/temperatures. It grows well in warm sunny places. You have to be careful re. Overwatering too.

I recall being told basil is sensitive to temperature changes and doesn't like the moving between the place it grows / the supermarket / your house

I've grown it successfully from seed in the garden

Potted supermarket herbs can be kept alive but you need to repot it almost straight away and divide the plant in half. The roots are too bound up to survive for long otherwise.
It's also difficult to keep basil alive during the colder months, I've grown it outside from a supermarket pot during the summer but the first chilly night and it dies back.

Thank you all for your replies. I think I have grown it once from seed, but it didn't really thrive. Not warm enough, probably. Maybe keep it in a south facing window next.

I bought a pot from Sainsbury in April and it thrived for about three months in a north facing window. Have never had one live that long before. The next one did almost as well but every pot I've bought since had died within days.

The large potted ones I buy from supermarkets always last for months on the north facing windowsill in our kitchen. I only water them when they wilt.

I had a supermarket one for ages on the window sill. I only ever watered it from the bottom.

When I saw the thread title 'Basil' I thought it was under Baby Names!!!!!

Just no!

My basil grows beautifully in a terracotta pig on the kitchen windowsill.

Basil and Cecil would definitely be out as baby names. I have tipped mine, it was too sad.