Sage

Sage is one of the few culinary herbs that genuinely becomes more interesting the longer you grow it. A first-year plant is a small mound of soft silver-green leaves. A five-year plant is a dense, woody shrub knee-high, with a gnarled base and more aromatic oil in its leaves than it had when it was young. The flavor concentrates as the plant matures. Gardeners who grow sage for one season and move on to something new are missing most of what it has to offer.

Like most Mediterranean herbs, sage wants full sun, lean-to-moderate soil, and drainage it can trust. The fastest way to lose a sage plant is to give it rich, moist soil and expect it to behave like a leafy annual. It will grow quickly at first, then become susceptible to root rot, particularly through wet winters in zones 5 and 6. Well-drained raised beds, slightly alkaline soil, and gravel mulch near the crown can prevent the main winter failure mode.

Start seeds indoors 10 weeks before your last frost. Sage is slow to germinate — three to four weeks — and slower still to reach transplantable size, which is why such a long indoor lead time helps. Most gardeners find it easier to buy transplants. Set them out 2 weeks after the last frost and give each plant 18 inches of space. In the first year, harvest lightly — a few stems at a time — to let the plant establish.

Once established, sage needs pruning more than it needs watering. Cut back by one-third in spring, before new growth emerges, to keep the plant from going all wood at the base. After four or five years, even with regular pruning, the center tends to open up and lose vigor. At that point, take cuttings from healthy stem tips to propagate new plants, or cut the whole thing back hard — it often resprouts strongly. The ornamental varieties (Purple, Tricolor, Golden) tend to be shorter-lived than common green sage and may need replacing every three to four years.

One thing the seed packet doesn't mention: sage blooms in late spring and the flowers are worth leaving on. They are purple and tubular and bees cover them for two weeks. If you cut the flowers off before they open, you get a slightly more compact plant. If you leave them, you get a pollinator hub and the leaves are still perfectly good to use. After flowering, cut back by one-third to encourage new growth and keep the plant tidy.