Growing chives in pots: Advice from spring through winter

It is incredibly satisfying to head out to the garden with a pair of scissors to snip fresh herbs for a meal. Having multiple chive plants is essential in my garden. I love growing chives in pots. Many of my plants are self sown, so I rescue them from the gravel or the mulch, or wherever they have decided to live, and find a container for them. In this article, I’ll share advice for containers and growing medium, as well as basic care and what you should do with your plants in the winter.

Chives’ diminutive stature, smaller than many of their allium cousins, like leeks and onions, makes them well-suited to container gardens and even to indoor herb gardens. This hardy perennial is one of the first plants to make an appearance in the spring, if they’re grown outdoors, followed a few weeks later by the gorgeous flowers.

About chives

As perennial herbs that survive down to between -40°F and -30°F (-40°C to -34.4°C), chives may be the easiest onion-family plant to grow. Chives do not form a bulb. We grow them instead for their above-ground leaf parts. Chives’ hollow, slender leaves stand up straight, like young onions, and reach about 10 to 12 inches (25 to 30 cm) tall. Their tiny purple flowers, clustered to create a larger-looking globe-shaped bloom, open in late spring or early summer. The plants have a clump-forming growth habit and depending on where they’re grown, should be divided every few years in the spring.

In the kitchen, chives are a delightful addition to savory dishes. A sprinkling of chives over your food, like eggs and soups, at the end of cooking adds a green confetti and a bright, mild onion flavor. Those flowers, too, are edible! Break apart a cluster of the tiny blossoms to add a pop of purple to your salads and garnish to your plates. Put  whole blooms into a jar of vinegar to infuse the vinegar with a gorgeous purple hue and mild onion flavor, which you can use to dress salads and marinate meats.

Why grow chives in pots?

• Chives grow in clumps, which gives them an interesting and attractive look.
• Their springtime blooms are beautiful and attract pollinators.
• The plants are small, making them the right size for just about any container and for an indoor herb garden.
• They have only a mild onion scent that you won’t notice, say, sitting nearby the chive pot on a patio.
• As perennials, chives come back year after year and can be overwintered indoors for fresh herbs throughout the coldest months.
• Consider chives a “cut and come again” herb. Snip what you need, and the leaf will regrow so you can harvest all season long.
• You can sow seeds directly into the pot, start them indoors in trays and transplant chives as seedlings, or divide more mature clumps and use those as transplants.
• Chives have few pests, but onion maggots can be a problem. Growing chives in pots, you control the growing medium, so you don’t have to worry about onion maggots taking over a garden space.

Chive varieties for container growing

There are two types of chives:

Common chives (Allium schoenoprasum): This is the variety of chives we think of first and the one being described in this article. Various seed companies may have specialized common chive varieties, such as ‘Dolores’.

Garlic chives or Chinese chives (Allium tuberosum): These chives have a garlic flavor instead of an onion flavor. Its white flowers bloom later in the season. The leaves are flat instead of round. Here, too, you may find specialized varieties, including ‘Geisha’.

The best containers for growing chives

The top consideration for selecting a container for growing chives is drainage. While there are many beautiful indoor and outdoor herb garden containers available, your plants are more concerned with how much moisture is around their roots than with how pretty their pot may be. Select chive-growing pots with at least one drainage hole in the bottom.

Which potting soil to use to grow chives

Chives have a taste for soils high in organic matter with a pH of 6 to 7. Just as important as the nutrients in the soil is the water-retention properties of it. Use well-draining soil mix for growing chives in pots. Don’t use regular garden soil, as it’s likely too heavy.

How to care for chives growing in pots

While chives can tolerate partial shade, you’ll have the most if the container receives six to eight hours of direct sunlight. A perk to growing chives in pots as opposed to in the garden is that you can move your pots to follow the sun through the seasons.

Unless you’re trying to produce chive seeds, cut off the flower stalks at the soil after blooming is complete so the plant puts its energy into producing more leaves. If you leave the seeds, you’ll likely find more chive plants the following year growing near the original plant!

Avoid over-fertilizing chives. They are one of the plants I worry the least about and they come back year after year. But, it doesn’t hurt to mix a handful of compost into the potting soil once a year to improve the organic matter and to replace the nutrients the plants used the year before.

Watering chives in pots

It’s best for chives to have uniform soil moisture rather than a fluctuating pattern of too much and too little. Just enough water every few days is best. A shallow layer of mulch on top of the soil will help to maintain uniform moisture.

Harvesting container chives

Harvest chives you grew in pots the same as you would chives from your garden: Starting when the leaves are 3 to 4 inches long (7.5 to 10 cm), pinch them with your fingertips or snip them with garden scissors at the soil line. The younger the chives are, the more tender. Regular harvesting encourages more growth. (Find more chive harvesting tips here.)

Will potted chives survive the winter?

Grown in the ground, chives are hardy against the cold weather. Their leaves die back, but their roots hold steady in the soil, insulated by the earth around them. In pots, chives need more protection from the bitter cold and should be brought indoors or at least put in a protected location, like a basement, before a freeze.

If your chives are in a more sizeable pot—for example, I have mine in half of a whisky barrel—add a bit of leaf mulch on top to insulate them for the winter and they should come back in the spring.

Growing chives in pots indoors in the winter, your challenge will be to give them enough light. Choose a sunny windowsill. You may also need to supplement with grow lights. Without enough light, your plants may start to die back. Don’t worry, they should start growing again when adequate light returns in the spring.

Other herbs to grow in pots

• The seven best herbs for container gardening
• Container herb gardening tips
• Lemon balm
• Basil
• Pineapple sage