how soon can you smell basil?

Hello,
I'm a first time gardener, I purchased a small pot of basil that I keep in a container within a flowerbed...I purchased it in the early Spring, and now I have seedlings all over this particular bed...I'm not sure if it's the basil or a couple of other plants I have near by (or even weeds!)...I'm waiting to let them get a little larger so that I can identify them before I pull them up...

Obviously, basil has such a strong and specific scent but these seedlings don't...So my question is, how soon does basil develop its scent? Would I be able to smell them by now? They are all between a half inch and 2 inches high...

They all look identical, I'm almost positive they all come from the same plant...

Thanks!
-abl

Can you post a picture? Seems like you'd be able to smell them by now.

I grow basil from seed and even before they have their "true" leaves, when I thin them, I can smell regular basil and the lemon and lime basil on my fingers. The purple basils don't really get a basily smell until a little bigger - maybe an inch tall or so. There's a photo of Sweet Dani Lemon Basil on my web page http://kmom246.icfsc.com/herbs042807-1.htm - it looks very similar to a "regular Sweet Basil".

The lemon and the lime basil do have a distinct odor when plantlets. It will be a more distinct odor when dry.

Has your basil bloomed yet? It can't deliver seeds till after blooming so maybe these are from another plant.

I don't let mine bloom, keeping them pinched back till later summer.

thanks y'all...as soon as we get a day of sun, I'll take some pictures of the varying heights of these seedlings and maybe we can rule out the basil...even the largest don't have a basil odor...to me, they almost smelled like old cigarettes! it had a "dirty" sort of smell...

podster, actually it bloomed only a few weeks after we bought it...maybe in april sometime? i pinched off the blooms right away because i remembered reading that i should do that...it hasn't bloomed since...

i'll try and get some pics up this weekend...

thanks everyone!

Ewwww! Dirty cigarettes, imagine that added to the salad! Yuk! LOL

I wonder how quickly after blooming basil can deliver seed. I think another good reason to keep the blooms pinched is the flavor is strongest before it blooms. Will look forward to pictures... and I am sure you will look forward to a day of sun. : )

Basil gets bitter after it flowers, doesn't it? I wonder if oregano does, too....

It's awfully difficult to keep ahead of the blooms on basil out here. Last year, as long as we kept at it good enough to keep the buds from elongating and actually blooming, the taste was good. If it bloomed, then we'd cut it way back and the new growth was again good. We've been better at keeing them pinched back this year - but then again, it's still early in the season - when the temps are reliably in the three digits, then it will REALLY be a race to keep them pinched. I love the flowers, though, so we are growing some just for the flowers.

Uh oh ~ both the oregano and marjoram are in bloom and I was loving the blooms. I hope they don't get bitter too....

I sheared my oregano back yesterday because I don't want it seeding all over the place. I have four o'clocks and cosmos seeds planted near them, too, so I want to know that it's them coming up, not oregano. LOL

I can't imagine steady temps in the three digits. I will say, though, that we've not had the a/c on yet this year and I'm adapting to the heat. If I'm home during the day, I tend to be outside on our patio beneath a couple of umbrellas or out in the yard. We've not had very high humidity this year, so that's been nice.

remember - the bitter ones are the seedlings, not my basil plant that i bought from the nursery...that one still smells divine...every time i walk past i rub my fingers against the leaves and steal a sniff...who needs perfume? nature is divine!

the seedlings are the ones that are kind of stinky...i really don't think they are the basil afterall, but i'll post the pics later so you all can compare to your basil plants...

Could they be sage? I grew Clary sage from seed a few years ago and it STUNK like sweatsocks.

One of the things I really like about my little garden is that there are different types of basil tucked here and there. Some don't get enough sun and will never be the "big, take over plants" that others will be, but to be able to brush their leaves and smell lemon or lime or "traditional" basil or oregano or a general "spicey" scent is a total delight... mix with that the smell of tomato leaves - a total delight for the nose!

Ooh, love the scents, yes. Don't tomato plants smell wonderful after it rains?

I'm definitely with you on the wonderful scents from the tomato plants and herbs out in the garden!

Reading through the above, if you pinched off the blooms on that basil soon after the flowers appeared, then your little seedlings are not basil. It takes several weeks for basil seed to mature after blooming, and the flower stalks get brown and dry looking by the time the seeds are ready -- you'd have noticed!

Other herbs like oregano do get bitter if allowed to flower, but just like with basil I think that if you prune them back hard then the new growth will taste just fine.

gardenwife,
no it can't be sage because i don't have any of that growing in my garden...i figured it would be something i purchased for that flowerbed that seeded itself all over the place, OR weeds...

i'm beginning to think it could be the Candy Corn Vine I have growing in the same bed - however - I have never read anywhere that this vine would do this...I've only had it a couple of months, is it possible for it to drop seeds all over the place and start popping up everywhere?

if it's the CC Vine, i don't mind, because i love it...

but do most seedlings looks familiar until they get a little "older"? i walked around my yard and saw other weeds that look very similar to these...

and here is my basil whose leaves are not growing in the same pattern as the ones above, also the leaves are serrated(sp?)...

You don't by any chance have some mexican petunia growing around there? Otherwise know as Ruellia? The leaves favor and these plants pop seeds and spread them far and wide.

What is a candy corn vine? That's a new one on me. pod

podster,
no i don't think i've ever had mex. petunia growing near here, but we just moved in a year ago, so ya' never know...this spring, we cleaned out all of our beds...we had some horrible invasives taking over, since we hadn't done anything in our beds since we arrived here...we got rid of several inches of soil, weeded, put down new soil and mulched...the only thing i left in this small bed was a huge beautiful Plumeria tree...

then we went to the nursery and bought a ton of "stuff" that we liked...those nursery plants stayed in their temp. containers for a month or 2 while we cleaned out the rest of our beds...they have since gone to their permanent homes around the yard...the candy corn vines are the ones i planted in this bed next to our Plumeria...they are climbing up a trellis...

http://davesgarden.com/pf/go/1338/

i saw an article about them in a local paper a couple of years ago, and knew when we had our first home, i would plant them here...i LOVE them...they are so cute...

but all the reading i did about them has never indicated that they would seed all over the place like this...i found it strange...

so in this small bed I have a Plumeria, candy corn vines, a pot of basil, and a TON of these little seedlings popping up like crazy...so do y'all think these are probably weeds?

Thanks for the link ~ I had never heard it called that, just the other names. I shouldn't think it would reseed that quickly either. I do suspect weeds of some sort. The curious side of me would let a few grow to see what might turn out... Some weeds and wildflowers are pretty, of course, they may not fit in in that bed.

This is one I just discovered... Intend to save seeds from it to plant at home. Basket flower ~ Centaurea

Some weeds are worth saving....

podster,
would you agree that it's not the basil though?

I don't think the basil would have seeded, no. Unless you spilled a seed packet LOL

ok thanks!
and thanks to everyone else who chimed in too!

i'm going to let a few of these grow out to see what they are...especially the ones close to the trellis, in case they are candy corn vine...

will let ya know...

-abl

One of those links called CCV a cigar plant -- maybe that explains the smell?

wow, wouldn't that be funny!
'cept the "adult" CCV i have doesn't have a smell at all...

the seedlings are growing so fast, they just HAVE to be weeds...