Michele, you can easily find lemon grass stems/stocks in mexican grocery stores. Buy some and cut it from middle and plant the lower bulb type looking end in soil. Keep it moist and it will grow for you in two weeks time. Last year I did the same and I planted them in the ground and it grew like crazy and have many plants. I am planning to bring some inside for winter and rest will go in freezer. You could get the stems for $1-2 easily and grown it from stem would be good than seeds. Winter is coming so it might not grow that fast. Search google and you will find planting methods with picture. Jasmine

Hi, I know this is an old post, but I wanted to mention that I bought a small clump of lemon grass at the nursery this spring and it turns out, it is not the kind that you find in Asian cooking, but another kind. I think this one is edible, too, but wasn't what I was looking for. I stopped at the local Asian grocer and bought several stalks of the lemon grass they had and it didn't have any roots on it. When I got it home, I trimmed the looser leaves from the stalks and then stuck them in about an inch of water in a small bucket and left them under the shade of the fig tree out front. In about 4-5 days, the stalks started to sprout roots and are anxious to get those roots into some soil, so I will now pot them up and see which ones do the best. noss

I've written this here before, but I keep lemongrass in a pot - and I keep it in the ground. Each spring, after all danger of frost (which will definitely kill it), I take out the pot of lemongrass that I overwinter in a sunny room in my house. I trim back all the dead leaves and sprouts, then dump the whole clump out of the pot into my wheelbarrow. Using a shovel, I cut the clump in two (I could break it into more pieces). One half I place back in the pot with new potting soil and compost. I do not use an extremely large pot, because I want it to be reasonable for moving into the house in winter and then doing all of what I just described. That pot stays out in a very sunny location all summer, grows to refill the pot, and it will be moved in before any danger of frost. I harvest from it as I like all summer. The other half I plant in a very sunny location in my garden. It grows huge, and actually makes the most flavorful and juicy lemongrass for harvest all summer long. It definitely dies completely once it gets cold enough here in my zone 7 garden. I've been doing this for 5 or 6 years now, and I see no reason I won't be able to continue. I get plenty of lemongrass. By the way, I also grow lemon verbena in pots that have to be moved in every winter. I grow lemon balm in pots to keep it from taking over, but I leave it out. For some reason, one of my pots of lemon balm died completely last winter, a particularly harsh one, but I just divided the one that survived, and both pots are full again. They are forecasting another cold winter - I'll probably move most of my potted mints and things I leave out to a more protected part of my yard for this winter.

I can tell you about the ones I've grown, though my climate is much different from yours. When you think about what to plant with rosemary, look for other woody, drought tolerant Mediterranean herbs. Lemon grass, being an Asian herb, needs much more water. I've planted mine (started from grocery store stalks) in between the artichokes, and here and there in places with varying degrees of available moisture. The ones growing best are in gallon hydroponics pots inside a trough that gets afternoon shade and an inch or two of bottom water a day. Lemon Balm very does well in shallower containers and full sun. This is another plant that I grew to the point of being rootbound, before dividing, and ended up with 4 or 5 plants from one start. It is drought tolerant, but like all herbs, it likes drainage, and grows better with regular water and haircuts. Lemon Verbena wants warm, warm, warm weather. I don't know how it overwinters in your zone, but probably not at all well. I keep watering my last year's (maybe dead) LV that i left in an unprotected outdoor container because we are still having cool nights and the plant SEEMS to be well rooted. At least it doesn't come up when I give it a hard yank, but it's not showing any life at all. This plant is so temperature sensitive that it will drop all its leaves at any sudden change, but will come back once the temperatures stabilize. If you have that problem, don't worry. if your plants are looking differently sick, then worry. If the root ball seems overly moist, try repotting to a dryer mix. If you want to keep the plant around next fall, do what I should have done and clip it down 2/3, bring it inside and let it redevelop as an indoor plant. Or take some growing tips and root them in smaller pots. But, alas, I haven't met Sweet Cicely yet. jan