What's a good, low-maintenance option for a small herb garden/grow box?

[eppur_se_muova]

I'd like to have fresh parsley and cilantro on hand all the time. Also, occasionally, chives, mint, tarragon, basil.

Something that can be moved inside in cold weather would be best, but it's warm enough most of the year here that we could leave it outside most of the year. (Hardiness zone 7b)

A DIY option, if it's not too complicated, would be OK. I mostly want to know what people have found to be good features, and what not.

[Kali]

1. I would just use regular cheap plastic pots or buckets.

depending on floors and such, grow bags are another option.

[Major Nikon]

2. I live in zone 8 and grow most of mine in my flower beds

My rosemary survives pretty much all winters and it’s on the north side of my house. If you have a spot next to your home or a wall or something that gets good sun exposure and is on the south side, you can probably get by with growing a lot of herbs and leaving them outside.

If you must bring them in, I’d suggest a terrace style vertical planter rack.

[eppur_se_muova]

3. "terrace style vertical planter rack" and Google worked wonders!

It helps to have a good name for what you're trying to find, thanks!

[2naSalit]

4. I have...

A grape crate (~28"x12"x8&quot that I lined with several layers of newspaper, all the way up the sides covering the openings between slats, filled it with soil and planter spinach, two kinds of lettuce and some radishes. The radishes are iffy but the leafy stuff is doing great. For individual herbs, I just use an 8" pot and plant a few seeds for things like basil and parsley.

The crate may come in for the winter, I'll put it on an old end table with a water catch tray below it and keep growing the fast greens like lettuce and spinach.

That's my greens box experiment this year.

[Backseat Driver]

5. FWIW, my tips: Don't put (pepper)mints in the ground - invasive spreader!

Lemon balm is in the mint family and spreads invasively as well. With a 3 ft height, it will spread (seed and root systems) and will throw shade on anything planted behind it. Has medicinal effects and used in cosmetics, but in the same family as mints (see above).

cheap container or pot to hold dirt - nursery transplants.

Lavender seeds take a long time to germinate, so likely too late to start. Larger mature plants are perenniels in 6b and somewhat drought and soil hardy - mulched, they will overwinter fine.

I've always had trouble with cilantro (drys easily and not stable in stormy winds).

[Retrograde]

8. Heed the advice of Backstreet Driver

mint is worse than oxalis when it comes to taking over. Tomorrow's garden chore is pulling the current crop of mint - and this plot had been dug and (we thought) all the mint pulled earlier this year.

At least the spearmint doesn't seem to self-seed, unlike the lemon balm.

I've had lavender self-seed, but then I live in California.

[NJCher]

6. put on your calendar

to sow cilantro every 21 days or so.

[Jilly_in_VA]

7. Here's what I have in pots on my upper deck

which my husband refers to as the "sky garden":
in a hanging basket together, creeping rosemary and creeping thyme, which I'll bring inside come winter.
Chives--they have been coming back in the same pot for at least 5 years.
Mint (spearmint)--also a returner, by itself in a big ol' pot. I leave it alone and it doesn't bother anything else.
Greek oregano--the stuff shocked me by coming back this year, and I divided it and gave half to a friend.
Basil--replant every year. Just regular sweet basil, no fancy stuff. Last year I had lettuce-leaf, and the bugs liked it too much.
Thai Basil and Par-cel (cutting celery)--in the same big pot. Par-cel is something I never heard of untilI started buying my herbs from the local greenhouse, but I love it. The stalks taste like celery and the leaves taste like regular parsley.
Italian (flat leaf)parsley and sage--in the same pot. The parsley doesn't need re-planting the way cilantro does if you cut it from the outside, apparently. Sage is sometimes a returner but wasn't this year. (I left it outside)
Hyssop--just grown "for pretty" as my Mennonite neighbors say, it comes back every year. Apparently has medicinal properties.

[Retrograde]

9. I've lately had luck with small plantings of cilantro

in plastic pots. I've tried sowing it in the garden, but it's fussy - it bolts if you look at it wrong. In pots, I have enough for a few sprigs at a time when I need them.

I think I need to do another planting soon.

[Retrograde]

10. Basil is an annual

but basil plants are easy to find in nurseries, and they grow well in pots. I've kept one plant going until November by moving it around, but I don't expect to keep them over winter - even in California.

I use plastic pots that nurseries use - they can be cleaned and reused. And if you know someone who gardens, they probably have some they want to get rid of.

Parsley tends to have large taproots, but with a deep enough pot it might be possible - I've always done it in the ground. Chives seem to do well (unless the cat decides to eat them), but my pot-grown ones never seem to get very thick. They do blossom occasionally, and steeping the blossoms in vinegar will give you something of the taste of chives.

Have you considered vegetables as well? Plant growers have developed hybrid tomatoes that do well in pots (and, in their native lands tomatoes are perennials, so it should be possible to keep them inside in the winter. They do need sun to set and ripen fruit though) as well as peppers. I'm doing a lot more container gardening, since my soil is what's called adobe, and I've gotten respectable crops of peppers, tomatoes, and eggplants.

[Danascot]

11. We have herbs

in plastic planters that fit on a deck or porch railing. We have basil, cilantro, oregano and dill, all doing well. They're not so heavy they can't be picked up and moved inside or elsewhere. They're also at a convenient height on the railings.