Grow and Care for False Rosemary

Grow false rosemary in full sun, on dry sand that drains, and skip extra water once the roots are in. False rosemary is Conradina canescens.

Give it full sun, dry sand, and room to spread 2 to 4 feet

False rosemary wants full sun and a hole of dry sand that stays dry after rain. Water a new shrub through the first dry weeks, then ease off; an established plant takes missed water better than soggy sand. [1] False Rosemary is a spreading evergreen mound about 2 to 5 feet tall and 2 to 4 feet wide, with needle-like gray-green leaves that smell minty when you crush them. [2] Once the roots are in, skip extra water and skip rich compost that stays wet. Wet sand and later shade are the usual reasons this shrub declines. Lavender to white two-lipped flowers can run from spring into fall.

Plant a nursery shrub, and keep it off the first dune

Buy a nursery plant in a 4-inch or quart pot if you can find one. Slide the root ball out and set it at the same depth it sat in the pot, in dry sand that drains.

1. Plant a nursery shrub from a 4-inch or quart pot. Do not dig a wild plant from a dune. [3]
2. Slide the root ball out. Set it at the same depth it sat in the pot, in dry sand that drains. Leave 2 to 4 feet so the mound can fill in.
3. Water it in, then skip extra water once new growth shows.
4. Keep a new nursery plant off the first dune line, where wind and salt spray hit the foliage. Once it is set, coastal sand is fine; a tender pot plant is not ready for that spray.

Pinch after you plant

Pinch the tips after you plant, or within a week, so the shrub branches instead of staying one skinny stem. Do that while it is in active growth. Do not shear it like a kitchen-rosemary hedge.

1. Pinch the growing tips after planting, or within a week, to start side branches.
2. Leave the mound through winter. Cut only dead wood then.

Root a 4-inch cutting in pine bark

The usual way to start a new shrub is a tip cutting. Seedlings may appear later in bare sand, but there is no reliable home seed recipe. Do not root this plant in a glass of water the way kitchen rosemary is often started.

1. Take a 4-inch nonbranched tip during the growing season and strip the leaves from the bottom half inch.
2. Stick it a half inch to three-quarters inch deep in pine bark or another mix that drains. Rooting hormone helps, but a clean cut in bark that drains still works.
3. Keep the mix barely moist under a mist, or in a bright spot out of standing water, for 3 to 4 weeks until roots form, then water by hand for another 2 to 3 weeks.
4. Move it to a 4-inch or quart pot after the roots fill the cell, and pinch the tips so it branches before it goes in the ground.

Not kitchen rosemary — and not Florida rosemary

Kitchen rosemary is a Mediterranean herb grown for cooking. If the tag says rosemary, Tuscan Blue, or a potted Christmas-tree rosemary, read How to Grow Sage.

Florida rosemary is Ceratiola, a sandhill shrub with tiny yellow-brown flowers, not this mint-family mound. If the tag says Florida rosemary or sand heath, read How to Grow Florida Rosemary. Coastal rosemary is Westringia, an Australian hedge. If the tag says coastal rosemary or Mundi, read How to Grow Coastal Rosemary. A low calamint mound sold as lesser calamint is How to Grow Calamint; an old Calamintha canescens name on a tag is this Conradina shrub, not calamint. [4] Do not eat false rosemary as an herb substitute.

If the sand stays wet, move the shrub to a hole that drains, and skip extra water once the roots are in.