is the essential guide to growing herbs and designing, planting, improving, and caring for herb gardens. People now use herbs in their cooking on an everyday basis and there's nothing nicer than being able to go out into your garden, snip some fresh herbs and put them straight into the pot. The beauty of an herb garden is that it does not have to be big - it can be part of a larger garden or it can merely be a window box. More than 330 color illustrations and diagrams, backed with easily followed text, help gardeners at all skill levels learn to buy, plant, tend, and harvest a rich bounty of herbs. Complete herb identification and growing instructions are provided for annuals, biennials, bulbs, herbaceous perennials, and shrub-like herbs. There are also planting patterns for a compact cartwheel garden, corner and narrow planting beds, and formal herb gardens, and much more—plus information on preparing herbs for culinary use.