People often think of sage as a culinary herb, but it has many medicinal properties. In fact, sage has been used for centuries to treat various ailments. If you’re interested in learning how to grow sage, here is a step-by-step guide.
What is Sage?
Sage refers to plants in the genus Salvia, family Lamiaceae (previously Labiatae), which has 750 herb, sub-shrub, and shrub species. It is a member of the mint family and is native to the Mediterranean. Sage is sometimes used as an ornamental plant, but it is mostly known for being used in cooking and medicine. Sage may be the perfect solution if you want to add flavor to your cooking or relieve aching muscles.
- The main horticultural species is Salvia officinalis L.
- Common names: Garden Sage and Common Sage.
- Cultivars: Albiflora, Purpurascens, Purpurea, Tricolor.
Varieties of sage
- Pineapple sage
- Mexican bush sage
- Scarlet sage
- Mealycup sage
- White sage
- Clary Sage
- Greek Sage
- Hummingbird sage
- Autumn sage
History of sage
The sage plant has a long and storied history, with many different uses dating back centuries. It has been used as a medicinal herb and spice plant for centuries. It was once thought to have mystical properties and was used in potions and tonics for everything from colds to indigestion. Today, sage is grown commercially in a variety of nations for both its dried leaves and essential oil.
Uses of Sage
You can find sage in many forms, including dried leaves, essential oils, and capsules. In ancient times, it was often used for its medicinal properties and was thought to ward off evil spirits. Today, sage is still used for its health benefits, as it is known to help relieve indigestion and menstrual cramps.
Also, it is believed to have anti-inflammatory and antibacterial properties. It is also a popular ingredient in many food dishes, giving them a savory flavor. Sage can be found fresh or dried and is often used to make tea. No matter how it is used, sage is sure to add a touch of flavor to any dish.
Dried herb. Sage is a popular western herb used in bird stuffings, meat, and fish dishes. Sage is used to flavor meats, sausages, and poultry stuffings.
Essential oil. Sage oil is used in perfumes, as a deodorant, and as a calmative.
Herbal use. Tea from sage is used to treat excessive sweating and neurological problems, to calm people down, and to help nursing mothers. Gargle and wound lotions are also advised. Sage is used as a calmative and maybe to lower fevers.
How To Grow Sage (Salvia officinalis): Step-by-Step Guide
Here’s a step-by-step guide on how to grow sage. It contains practical tips on the different stages of plant growth and essential information about soil and sunlight requirements, fertilization, pests and diseases, harvesting, processing, and preserving.
Growing sage from seed
You can plant seeds up to two weeks before the last expected frost date.
Germination.
Sage seed germinates slowly and inconsistently. Sage is hard to grow from seeds, so many growers prefer non-flowering varieties, cuttings, and seedlings instead.
Seedling production
Sage’s big seed makes vacuum seeding easy. Homemade vacuum seeders are suitable for small-scale enterprises. You’ve fit the vacuum cleaner into a plastic container the size of a seedling tray. Drill holes on the opposite side that are 0.5 mm in diameter to match the cell centers. Seeds are suctioned against the holes until they are put over the seedling tray and clipped. This process can swiftly seed lots of trays. Purchasing seedlings from a reputable nursery is more economical when planting extensive areas of sage than trying to grow them yourself.
Storage of seeds
Storing the seeds at 10 to 30°C for a year causes losing viability. Ensure a 5°C temperature during storage to maintain the seed’s viability for 5 to 6 years.
Growing sage from cuttings
Sage is easy to propagate from cuttings, and clonal plots are excellent for establishment. You can grow sage throughout the year from semi-soft tip cuttings. You must apply 500 ppm IBA, 500 ppm NAA, bottom heat, and mist to increase the striking rate. A fine potting mix of 1 part vermiculite, 1 part peat, and 1 part perlite with agricultural lime to correct pH is best. You can add slow-release nutrients like Osmocote® to the mix at a rate of 3g per L.
Sowing
Sage seedlings need well-formed beds. You can make a good bed after a fallow, rip, disc, and till with the help of a bed-forming rotary hoe. You should ensure the following distance while making beds:
- Bed-to-bed distance: 50–70 cm
- Row-to-row distance: 20–25 cm
The beds shouldn’t be wider than 50 cm and more than 2 rows of plants because light competition reduces middle row growth. Sage seedlings grow slowly, so weed management is essential. During fallow and cultivation, you should get rid of weeds. If you don’t, you’ll have to hire people or use chemicals to do it.
Plant spacing
Sage plant spacing varies by nation; 30 cm inside rows and 60 cm between rows were tested in the U.S. but were considered inadequate. In Australia, it has been shown that two staggered rows of 25 cm between plants on a 50 cm wide ridged bed is the best way to grow sage.
Fertilizer
Fertilizer addition depends on soil type and fertility. Before planting, in the U.S., you can use 1360 kg/ha of triple superphosphate (TSP) fertilizer, and following harvest, use nitrogen as a side dressing. Nitrogen makes leaves grow more and changes the color of crops, but don’t use too much.
Overuse results in extra costs and pollutes waterways. In the case of Australia, most herb crops are considered leafy vegetables, and the rates of NPK fertilizer range from 1200 to 1500 kg/ha. After each harvest, apply 75 kg/ha of ammonium nitrate as a side dressing. If the pH is below 5.5, apply agricultural lime before seeding.
Water requirements
You have to irrigate properly to reduce water stress and boost productivity. You employ spray, drip, or flood irrigation. Sage needs water like a green vegetable. Sage plants like well-drained soil with appropriate subsoil moisture. During seedling establishment, ensure the beds are damp but not wet.
Sage plants may be able to grow in dry conditions because they come from the Mediterranean, but sufficient water application will produce better products. Also, good water management boosts production and pays for itself. Sage loses water quickly in hot places, so you should have a backup way to water plants in Australia.
Light
Sage grows best in full sun. Ensure the plants are not overshaded because it causes plants to etiolate and generate few leaves. Also, high light increases in oil production.
Disease control
During wet establishment times in the U.S. and Europe, You can use a mancozeb-based fungicide spray as a preventative measure. If you have a healthy climate, it is easy to protect plants from diseases.
You must monitor disease outbreaks during wet summers or after irrigation. Raised beds on free-draining soil are the best way to control root rot. Ridge planting is the best production strategy for sage in dry beds in Australia, as is not watering if it looks like it might rain. Using fungicides on sage is prohibited in Australia.
Weed control
Sage is difficult to weed, just like other herbs. You can grow a thick stand of pasture, then fallow the field before planting to eliminate weeds before planting the crop. Before planting, you should reduce the number of weed seeds by using chemical fallow and burying pasture crops.
Chemical weed control
New Zealand research on herbicides for sage suggests using Linuron (1 kg/ha) as a preemergence spray in the spring and Chloridazon as a follow-up spray after the weeds have grown. You can use Fusilade (2.5 L/ha) (active ingredient fluazifop) because it will not harm sage plants.
Mechanical weed control
Mechanical weed management by cultivation involves uprooting and burying weed seedlings. This works best with small, quickly-drying weeds. More established weeds may reshoot after cultivation.
Weed can grow between ridges, so you can chip the top of the ridge and the area between the rows by hand. Inter-row weeds will reduce once the canopy closes. Ridges, inter-row cultivation, and black plastic are all equally effective. You can increase the yield of Finnish sage dry matter by both methods.
The best time for mechanical weed control is during a fallow period. You can do it when planting and applying herbicides at different times. This allows weed management without putting too much pressure during soil cultivation, which damages soil structure and increases plow pans.
Use of mulch
Sage plants thrive when covered with weed-controlling organic and inorganic mulch. So, you can use organic or inorganic mulch. Polymeric inorganic mulches have uses besides weed control. Organic mulch should have sufficient organic waste material.
You can use organic mulch after the establishment of the seedling as it helps in plant growth and control weeds. You should compare the cost of using mulch with the benefits to plants.
While the plastic film is less expensive, excessive humidity and temperatures might cause sickness. Woven weed mats are more cost-effective. In Finland, people use plastic film as mulch.
Growing sage for oil production
Oil production varies by cultivar and country. Non-blooming plants produce the most oil. You have to pick sage before it flowers for oil production. An average oil yield is 1.8%.
Volatile oil constituents in sage
Sage oil’s properties vary by country and plant component. The oil is a pale yellow liquid with a warm, spicy, camphoraceous smell. The main ingredients are thujone (42%), cineol, borneol, caryophyllene, and other terpenes, but these can change depending on the country and the plant’s history.
Harvesting sage for volatile oil
Harvest lightly in the first year to allow the plant to develop fully. The composition and quantity of plant oil determine harvest time. You’ve to start harvesting when oil yields and desired oil components are at their highest.
You know sage plants have three sections:
- The top has young, new growth.
- The center has more mature growth.
- The bottom has older leaves.
Due to leaf senescence, dry matter yields drop as you move down the plant. Lower-maturity leaves have the most oil.
Oil content and dry matter production change with the season. Sage plants don’t reach their maximum oil content and dry matter at the same time, so harvest them when the dry matter is highest.
Harvesting in midsummer generated the most oil per hectare. You can use a typical forage harvester to cut the stems and put them in a distillation bin that trails behind it. This reduces double-handling before distillation. De-stemming or chopping may cause oil loss and raise processing costs.
Harvesting sage for dried leaf
Harvesting for dried products requires more attention than oil, and you have to use mechanical methods like a cutter bar in front of a conveyor belt. The belt lifts cut material to collection bins, reducing foliage damage. You can mow the sage, let it half dry, then windrow and collect with haymaking equipment.
After picking the plant, you should clean it to get rid of dirt and dust, which lowers the quality of the product. You can use mulched beds to avoid washing the plants. Sage’s tiny leaf hairs trap dust and debris, causing soil pollution. You should wash it before drying to reduce contaminants and increase quality.
Harvesting sage for fresh market
You should harvest only top-quality leaves by hand for the fresh market. You can cut and bunch the plants using a knife or clippers. Band the bunches with rubber and store them in cool boxes to remove field heat. Also, you can use a gasoline-powered hand hedge trimmer to shorten harvesting time. Hedge trimmer cutting requires sorting and classifying.
Sage oil distillation
You can use steam distillation or hydrodistillation to extract essential oil from sage. Hydrodistillation is a traditional method for extracting essential oils from plants. Steam distillation recovers volatile chemicals with a high boiling point from inert materials using saturated steam.
Drying and packaging sage for dry product
You should dry sage quickly after harvesting so the chlorophyll doesn’t break down and turns yellow-brown. Heat destroys the chlorophyll enzyme. Ensure proper drying; over 40°C heat can remove volatile oils, diminishing flavor. Also, reduce moisture to 13%. After drying, you must pack and ship the product to market, as volatile oil loss is constant.
The imported product must consist of the following criteria:
- Dried green to gray-green, oblong, lanceolate leaves and blooming tips.
- Dry leaves with fine short hairs and a strong, fragrant, aromatic odor.
- 10% stem by weight, excluding petioles.
- 1.0 mL of volatile oil per 100g.
- 95% pass through a U.S. standard No. 20 sieve.
- 95% of rubbed sage pass through a U.S. standard No. 40 sieve.
- Stored below 25°C
Cooling and packaging for fresh market
You must find the best temperature, humidity, air composition, container size, and handling methods to ensure the best quality. You can apply the same techniques as vegetables because they are similar. After cutting the herb, it reduces its quality because herb plants continue respiration and metabolic activities after cutting.
The plant breaks down its cells to continue respiration after using the water and carbohydrates in the stem during respiration and metabolic activities. This process speeds up its breakdown because bacteria and microbes start growing on it, and the plant smells and tastes terrible.
There are different ways to slow the deterioration of plants, like post-harvest protocols preserve turgor, texture, color, and oil content. To limit metabolic activity, you must avoid plant injuries, including bruising and tissue damage.
Temperature
You can reduce a plant’s biological reactions, such as respiration, by about 50% with the reducing temperature for every 10°C drops. You have to check two temperatures for fresh food post-harvest. First, precooling and field heat reduce metabolic activity (respiration). There are three ways to apply heat:
- Forced air cooling. It is the simplest and best for small producers because it uses a tiny cooling chamber and a high-speed fan.
- Vacuum cooling. It is the most efficient precooling method, but it’s expensive and only suitable for large production.
- Hydrocooling and liquid icing. Hydrocooling and liquid icing are used on fruit but not on succulent herbs.
Storage temperatures
You must ensure consistent temperature during storage. Ice formation during storage damages plant cell integrity. You must remove field heat before packaging to avoid developing a metallic odor.
Humidity during Storage
After harvesting, the internal humidity of plants is 100%, but it causes water loss and wilting. So, you must maintain high storage humidity to reduce water loss by reducing water transport from the plant to the air. 90–95% humidity is ideal because it reduces plant water loss without causing condensation on plants or containers, which encourages spoiling organisms. You can use film wraps or plastic-lined containers to maintain high humidity during storage.
Atmosphere
Environmental changes can reduce ethylene production while cutting the plants and lead to the breakdown of cell walls, loss of pigments, etc. You can minimize ethylene production by reducing the oxygen level of fresh air from 21% to 2-4% and increasing CO2 from 0.035% to 5-10%. Ensure CO2 level is above 7% and O2 below 5% during storage.
Production of sage as a fresh pot herb
You can grow fresh pot herbs in pots and sell them in supermarkets for cooking. Herbs supply a modest amount of fresh material and are also decorative. In the summer, you can sell sage plants every six weeks, and in the winter, every eight.
Verdict
Sage is a perennial crop with multiple harvests per year. You can grow sage seedlings and cuttings in the winter and seed them in the spring to establish the plants. Inorganic mulch is the most cost-effective way to get rid of weeds with compatible irrigation systems, and laying and planting costs are reasonable.