Ginger has turned out to be such an easy plant to grow. A couple of years ago we were given some rhizomes and I decided to keep them in a pot to contain their growth (anything that spreads from underground root systems should be kept in check in the garden). The added bonus of growing in pots is that ginger seems to like having constricted space, so small to medium pots will do the trick. Ginger loves moisture and filtered sunlight, so the pot sits underneath my mandarin tree, and the two get along really well, as the Mandarin blocks the westerly sun in summer.

Winter is a great time to harvest and replant ginger. It is July and the leaves on my potted ginger have turned brown and died back, so I removed the stems in preparation for digging up the rhizomes. I turned the pot upside-down into a cardboard box, and used a chopstick to gently loosen the dirt and separate out the roots. The rhizomes had done a great job of multiplying over the growth season, so there was enough of a harvest to share around. I saved a few rhizomes to replant, and cleaned the rest off under the hose before letting them dry at room temperature for a day or so. You can also harvest ginger thought the season, by digging out and breaking off small segments of the rhizome.

To replant, add some slow release fertiliser to store bought potting mix, and fill most of the pot. Lay the ginger lengthways across the surface of the soil, and cover with 2 inches of compost. Water in well, and leave to re-shoot in spring!