[Hesse2509]

I'm going to be planting a small herb bed at the plot this weekend, and plan to plant up much of the bed from pre-grown Lavender, Rosemary, Thyme etc. When it comes to the less hardy plants though such as Parsley and Coriander is it safe to plant the ones you find in pots in the herb section at the supermarket? I have done this in the past in the garden, but regard my allotment soil as more sacred, and don't want to cause problems with disease!

[DD.]

Yes you can, but what makes you think that parsley is not hardy?

It's a biennial, so will only see two years anyway, but will survive all but th toughest winters.

[arugula]

I find coriander easy to grow from seed planted direct. Up here, I won't be doing that just yet as it isn't warm enough. I normally do at least acouple if not more successional sowings during the summer. You might find a supermaret plant out of a pot getting a shock going outside and it will tend to bolt. Coriander can bolt quite easily when stressed.

[Ian_A]

most supermarket potted herbs will do quite happily at home under the right conditions.

To get maximum use and life you should separate the plants as they cram up to dozens of plants/seeds in one pot  - just pull apart gently, water well and plant. If you plant as they come, you will most likelynot get the amount of yield from them longer term.

[sunshineband]

You will probably find that once they haverecovered from the limp, 'just planted out' look, that they romp away and you have far more parsley than you can use

In our first year with the plot I planted out three small tubs of flat leaved parsley (50p each in the bargain bin at Asd@), split into smaller sections, to edge a bed.....

... gave away so much flat leaved parsley until it ran to seed midsummer the year after 

[tosca100]

I use the herbs first, cutting just above emerging growth, then split and pot into 3'' pots. They soon get going again, and I am still using last year's parsley which has grown well all through winter, so can give the new plants plenty of time to grow.

[JayG]

I've only tried it with parsley, mainly because the seed is rather short-lived and sometimes a bit slow to germinate - I soak the whole lot, tease out a few of the strongest plants and pot them up to get established before plonking them out in the garden.

Works OK for me, despite parsley not being known for liking being transplanted - I don't do it with the herbs which are easy to grow from seed, but I will be doing it with French Tarragon if I ever find any!