All,

My wife has successfully (maybe too successfully!) grown some parsley. It's
now about 2 feet high and growing. My understanding is that we should pinch
out all flowers, but should we prune it?

To me it seems to be getting tall and woody, but what do I know about herbs!

Thanks for suggestions,
Paul DS.

--
Please remove the "x-" if replying to sender.

In article ,
"Paul D.Smith" writes:
|
| My wife has successfully (maybe too successfully!) grown some parsley. It's
| now about 2 feet high and growing. My understanding is that we should pinch
| out all flowers, but should we prune it?
|
| To me it seems to be getting tall and woody, but what do I know about herbs!

Forget it. It is a biennial, and will flower, seed and die. She
needs to plant some more. If she plants some every year, then
she should always have some for use, except in the depths of
winter. In theory - some of us are not good at growing it ....



Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

In article , Paul
D.Smith writes
All,

My wife has successfully (maybe too successfully!) grown some parsley.

'Where the parsley grows the fastest
the master is the mistress'

It's
now about 2 feet high and growing. My understanding is that we should pinch
out all flowers, but should we prune it?

Parsley is a biennial - grows the first year, flowers the second. Once
it is flowering it gets very woody and is in effect useless. You can
prolong it's life a bit by cutting flowering stems as they appear, but
its a losing battle.

Best to re-sow every year, so you always have young first year growth,
with the second year plants to tide you over winter and spring.


--
Kay Easton

Edward's earthworm page:
http://www.scarboro.demon.co.uk/edward/index.htm

Thanks Nick,

One further question, since only the leaves are used, is there a way to
ensure a compact, bushy plant, albeit one that seeds and dies? I had always
expected herbs to be somewhat low lying wheras this seems to be making a bid
to be architectural!

Paul DS.

"Nick Maclaren" wrote in message
...

In article ,
"Paul D.Smith" writes:
|
| My wife has successfully (maybe too successfully!) grown some parsley.
It's
| now about 2 feet high and growing. My understanding is that we should
pinch
| out all flowers, but should we prune it?
|
| To me it seems to be getting tall and woody, but what do I know about
herbs!

Forget it. It is a biennial, and will flower, seed and die. She
needs to plant some more. If she plants some every year, then
she should always have some for use, except in the depths of
winter. In theory - some of us are not good at growing it ....



Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

On Thu, 20 May 2004 12:27:55 +0100, "Paul D.Smith"
wrote:

One further question, since only the leaves are used, is there a way to
ensure a compact, bushy plant, albeit one that seeds and dies? I had always
expected herbs to be somewhat low lying wheras this seems to be making a bid
to be architectural!

Parsley is an herb, not a landscape plant. :-) The stems can be used
as flavoring in soups & stews. You can't "prune" a plant without
branches.

The flower stalks are indeed a good deal taller than 1st year leaves.
That's just the way the plant grows. Mine is "in bud" now, and I'm
looking forward to a fresh supply of seed.

In article , Paul
D.Smith writes
Thanks Nick,

One further question, since only the leaves are used, is there a way to
ensure a compact, bushy plant, albeit one that seeds and dies? I had always
expected herbs to be somewhat low lying wheras this seems to be making a bid
to be architectural!

It is low lying - it's only the flowering stems which push skywards.
Grow it fresh each year, and get rid of the old plants once they stop
flowering.

by the way - bottom posting is the convention in this group. Please
don't top post as it muddles the threads.
--
Kay Easton

Edward's earthworm page:
http://www.scarboro.demon.co.uk/edward/index.htm

Kay,

I've not intentionally done any top/bottom posting :-(. I simply read a
message using OE 6.0 and then hit "reply" if I want to respond to the post.

For my own education, please define "top" and "bottom" posting. I've seen
lots of discussions (OK, flame wars or rants) regarding this subject but not
come across a simple definition. For example, if I see the following
hierarchy displayed - who posted "bottom" and who "top"?

Hello - Fred
Hello - Jim
Hello - Bob
Hello - Audrey
Hello - Julie
Hello - Nigel
Hello - Paul
Hello - Zee

Thanks/sorry,
Paul DS

"Kay Easton" wrote in message
...
In article , Paul
D.Smith writes
Thanks Nick,

One further question, since only the leaves are used, is there a way to
ensure a compact, bushy plant, albeit one that seeds and dies? I had
always
expected herbs to be somewhat low lying wheras this seems to be making a
bid
to be architectural!

It is low lying - it's only the flowering stems which push skywards.
Grow it fresh each year, and get rid of the old plants once they stop
flowering.

by the way - bottom posting is the convention in this group. Please
don't top post as it muddles the threads.
--
Kay Easton

Edward's earthworm page:
http://www.scarboro.demon.co.uk/edward/index.htm

In article ,
"Paul D.Smith" writes:
|
| I've not intentionally done any top/bottom posting :-(. I simply read a
| message using OE 6.0 and then hit "reply" if I want to respond to the post.

Please don't. In particular, you can do worse than top post if
you trust in Microsoft - such as posting your message in revoltingly
verbose and broken HTML.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

"Paul D.Smith" wrote in message
. net...
Kay,

I've not intentionally done any top/bottom posting :-(.

Yes you did - this answer of yours is 'top posted" :~(

I simply read a
message using OE 6.0 and then hit "reply" if I want to respond to the post.

For my own education, please define "top" and "bottom" posting.

Right - you'll wish you hadn't asked........:
http://mailformat.dan.info/quoting/bottom-posting.html

rest snipped for clarity

Jenny

In article , Paul
D.Smith writes
Kay,

I've not intentionally done any top/bottom posting :-(. I simply read a
message using OE 6.0 and then hit "reply" if I want to respond to the post.

I think that may be your problem ;-)
I'm told that OE automatically puts the cursor at the top and thereby
encourages top posting.

For my own education, please define "top" and "bottom" posting. I've seen
lots of discussions (OK, flame wars or rants) regarding this subject but not
come across a simple definition. For example, if I see the following
hierarchy displayed - who posted "bottom" and who "top"?

Hello - Fred
Hello - Jim
Hello - Bob
Hello - Audrey
Hello - Julie
Hello - Nigel
Hello - Paul
Hello - Zee

Well, that looks to me as if everyone bottom posted.
But that is when you see a hierarchy of post titles. The problem with
top and bottom posting is when you come to read the post itself. With
top posting, the new post appears at the top, and the one it is
responding to appears underneath.

With bottom posting, or as someone here phrased it rather better, in-
line posting, what you see is first, enough of the original post to
remind you what the point is, then the response from the new poster. If
there are answers to several different points, then the respondent
answers each directly below the relevant point. So you have a sequence
of point 1, answer1, point 2 answer 2 ... rather as I have done here.

When someone top posts in a group where bottom/in-line posting is the
norm, you get a right pig's ear - as here, where below (left unsnipped
for demonstration) you will find your original question followed by my
answer.

Thanks/sorry,
Paul DS

"Kay Easton" wrote in message
...
In article , Paul
D.Smith writes
Thanks Nick,

One further question, since only the leaves are used, is there a way to
ensure a compact, bushy plant, albeit one that seeds and dies? I had
always
expected herbs to be somewhat low lying wheras this seems to be making a
bid
to be architectural!

It is low lying - it's only the flowering stems which push skywards.
Grow it fresh each year, and get rid of the old plants once they stop
flowering.

by the way - bottom posting is the convention in this group. Please
don't top post as it muddles the threads.
--
Kay Easton

Edward's earthworm page:
http://www.scarboro.demon.co.uk/edward/index.htm



--
Kay Easton

Edward's earthworm page:
http://www.scarboro.demon.co.uk/edward/index.htm

"Kay Easton" wrote in message
...
In article , Paul
D.Smith writes
Kay,

I've not intentionally done any top/bottom posting :-(. I simply read a
message using OE 6.0 and then hit "reply" if I want to respond to the
post.

I think that may be your problem ;-)
I'm told that OE automatically puts the cursor at the top and thereby
encourages top posting.

For my own education, please define "top" and "bottom" posting. I've
seen
lots of discussions (OK, flame wars or rants) regarding this subject but
not
come across a simple definition. For example, if I see the following
hierarchy displayed - who posted "bottom" and who "top"?

Hello - Fred
Hello - Jim
Hello - Bob
Hello - Audrey
Hello - Julie
Hello - Nigel
Hello - Paul
Hello - Zee

Well, that looks to me as if everyone bottom posted.
But that is when you see a hierarchy of post titles. The problem with
top and bottom posting is when you come to read the post itself. With
top posting, the new post appears at the top, and the one it is
responding to appears underneath.

With bottom posting, or as someone here phrased it rather better, in-
line posting, what you see is first, enough of the original post to
remind you what the point is, then the response from the new poster. If
there are answers to several different points, then the respondent
answers each directly below the relevant point. So you have a sequence
of point 1, answer1, point 2 answer 2 ... rather as I have done here.

When someone top posts in a group where bottom/in-line posting is the
norm, you get a right pig's ear - as here, where below (left unsnipped
for demonstration) you will find your original question followed by my
answer.

Thanks/sorry,
Paul DS

"Kay Easton" wrote in message
...
In article , Paul
D.Smith writes
Thanks Nick,

One further question, since only the leaves are used, is there a way
to
ensure a compact, bushy plant, albeit one that seeds and dies? I had
always
expected herbs to be somewhat low lying wheras this seems to be making
a
bid
to be architectural!

It is low lying - it's only the flowering stems which push skywards.
Grow it fresh each year, and get rid of the old plants once they stop
flowering.

by the way - bottom posting is the convention in this group. Please
don't top post as it muddles the threads.
--
Kay Easton

Edward's earthworm page:
http://www.scarboro.demon.co.uk/edward/index.htm



--
Kay Easton

Edward's earthworm page:
http://www.scarboro.demon.co.uk/edward/index.htm

I think I see. So this is a bottom post, right? Main problem I see is that
with a top post, I know where the most recent, and therefore useful,
information is - at the top of the mail. With bottom posting, the start of
the most recent information is at some unknown point up from the end of the
mail. Oh, and for all I know, the responder has inserted responses too,
since that sometimes makes sense.

Note that I'm not trying to start a flame war here - this is just my initial
thoughts on bottom/top posting. I've been sent some more information
regarding this which I'll read to get the "feel" for why this upsets so many
people ;-).

Thanks for the info,
Paul DS.

Paul DS.

[snip]
I've not intentionally done any top/bottom posting :-(.

Yes you did - this answer of yours is 'top posted" :~(

No I didn't. I didn't in any way choose - I just started typing where the
cursor appeared!

[snip]

Right - you'll wish you hadn't asked........:
http://mailformat.dan.info/quoting/bottom-posting.html


Actually I'm glad I did. This explains all, including OEs behaviour. As
this link explains, top posting is common for business - guess where I am
whilst typing this! Top posting ensures that the response is clearly at the
top and cannot be lost in amongst other test that may not be clearly
indicated.

As an example, I monitor mailing lists where a posting may be a 10th level
response (yes, really). I can assure you that trying to sift through
interleaved "" and all the other variants of "mark my response",
together with various better or worse repaginations (i.e. line breaks in
weird and wonderful places) soon makes you realise why business uses
top-posting.

For OE's part, MS products are business orientated (no, I'm not an MS fan
but I still have to acknowledge some of their ideas). Business requires
both clarity (see above) and often a complete "paper trail". It is far
better to alway keep the entire "conversation" in all responses,
responses-to-responses etc. that use [snip]. For example, many businesses
do _not_ maintain "paper trails" so any responses to them _must_ contain the
original message or they have no context (I have little regard for this
"read is and discard" apporach but it happens!).

As to where a mail/news application places the cursor, as the link above
indicates, bottom posting is often "interleaved posting" in which case there
is no way the application can know where the responder will start so
starting "at the top", is the obvious solution.

Finally, don't think I can't see the benefits of the [snip] for home
(dial-up) users. I do my best to snip sensibly :-.).

rest snipped for clarity

Jenny



OK, bottom line - I'll try my best to not annoy too many people and will
pick top/bottom/interleaved as seems appropriate to circumstances and
"location". Now what was that phrase about pleasing all the people all the
time? :-)

Thanks for the education,
Paul DS.

In article ,
"Paul D.Smith" writes:
| "Kay Easton" wrote in message
| ...
|
| [ Quite a lot snipped ]
|
| I think I see. So this is a bottom post, right? Main problem I see is that
| with a top post, I know where the most recent, and therefore useful,
| information is - at the top of the mail. With bottom posting, the start of
| the most recent information is at some unknown point up from the end of the
| mail. Oh, and for all I know, the responder has inserted responses too,
| since that sometimes makes sense.

Yes, but it was a VERY BAD bottom post. You should have removed
the extraneous junk, in which case it becomes clear which aspect
of the previous posting you are replying to. Look at what I have
done.

Some threads accumulate many thousands of lines of responses, and
it would be insane to include everything, top or bottom.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.

"Pam Moore" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 20 May 2004 09:02:08 +0100, "Paul D.Smith"
wrote:

As I see it, you have two choices.
Either keep using it but cut off the tall stems which will produce
flowers and then seed.

I am new to gardening so please excuse me if this is a stupid question,
but....I have a large Parsley plant growing in a pot in my kitchen. A long
stem has suddenly appeared which has different leaves to the others and I am
assuming that this is the flower stem. Am I right in thinking that if I cut
off the long stem before the plant flowers, the plant will keep on growing
rather than flowering and dying? If this is the case, how long would the
plant last after I cut off the flower stem (indefinitely? 1 year?)

Jeannie

In article ,
"Jeannie" writes:
|
| I am new to gardening so please excuse me if this is a stupid question,
| but....I have a large Parsley plant growing in a pot in my kitchen. A long
| stem has suddenly appeared which has different leaves to the others and I am
| assuming that this is the flower stem. Am I right in thinking that if I cut
| off the long stem before the plant flowers, the plant will keep on growing
| rather than flowering and dying? If this is the case, how long would the
| plant last after I cut off the flower stem (indefinitely? 1 year?)

Not in my experience. Once it has started to form its flowering
shoot, it is beyond hope. You can delay the process a bit by
removing the flowering stem early enough, but it is better to
start with a new plant.

Your approach works with angelica (though don't bother trying that
in a pot), but I have never got it to work with parsley.


Regards,
Nick Maclaren.