Herbs Tea Garden

G

Gingergirl

Veteran Member
I was on an other board that had a thread on planting a Tea Garden. There were several mints and thymes listed, but not my favorite.
To keep down weeds, I had planted a creeping thyme that produced large, red blossoms. The bees were really interested. Thinking the flowers might be sweet, I tried one too. Wow. Sweet and very flavorful.
Now I harvest the blossoms all summer and throw them in the dehydrator. In the winter I make a very special tea that I love.
A very happy surprise from the garden.
 
psychgirl

psychgirl

Has No Life - Lives on TB
Gingergirl said:
I was on an other board that had a thread on planting a Tea Garden. There were several mints and thymes listed, but not my favorite.
To keep down weeds, I had planted a creeping thyme that produced large, red blossoms. The bees were really interested. Thinking the flowers might be sweet, I tried one too. Wow. Sweet and very flavorful.
Now I harvest the blossoms all summer and throw them in the dehydrator. In the winter I make a very special tea that I love.
A very happy surprise from the garden.
Click to expand...
I’ll have to remember this suggestion, thank you!
 
Babs

Babs

Veteran Member
I watch an Azerbaijani youtube channel of a couple on a farm. No speaking, just watching the couple do their daily activities, which is mostly cooking and tending their garden. They harvest and dry herbs, flowers & all sorts of plants all year long for tea. Tea is a very important ritual for the Azerbaijani people, and every episode features them having a good cup of tea.

They use calendula, rose petals, rose bud, rose hips, violets, lavender, various herbs, various citrus, and some wild plants and flowers that I cannot identify. It's really inspiring me to begin planting herbs and flowers for tea also!
 
packyderms_wife

packyderms_wife

Neither here nor there.
Gingergirl said:
I was on an other board that had a thread on planting a Tea Garden. There were several mints and thymes listed, but not my favorite.
To keep down weeds, I had planted a creeping thyme that produced large, red blossoms. The bees were really interested. Thinking the flowers might be sweet, I tried one too. Wow. Sweet and very flavorful.
Now I harvest the blossoms all summer and throw them in the dehydrator. In the winter I make a very special tea that I love.
A very happy surprise from the garden.
Click to expand...

do you know which creeping thyme you planted? I'd like to try this thyme is one of my favorite herbs second only to basil.
 
packyderms_wife

packyderms_wife

Neither here nor there.
Babs said:
I watch an Azerbaijani youtube channel of a couple on a farm. No speaking, just watching the couple do their daily activities, which is mostly cooking and tending their garden. They harvest and dry herbs, flowers & all sorts of plants all year long for tea. Tea is a very important ritual for the Azerbaijani people, and every episode features them having a good cup of tea.

They use calendula, rose petals, rose bud, rose hips, violets, lavender, various herbs, various citrus, and some wild plants and flowers that I cannot identify. It's really inspiring me to begin planting herbs and flowers for tea also!
Click to expand...

link to their channel?
 
Tundra Gypsy

Tundra Gypsy

Veteran Member
I tried to plant some peppermint one year and discovered how invasive it was!! I had it in a raised bed, and it wandered off in all directions; even went under the box and showed up in the walkway. Same thing with Lemon Balm; it wanted to take over my garden bed.
I guess they need to be in another part of the yard and away from my garden. Any thoughts as to what to do? I had horseradish in a black pot, and it escaped down through a drain hole and into a bed. Now I have a ton of horseradish, but it is still in that one area, away from the main garden. whew!
 
packyderms_wife

packyderms_wife

Neither here nor there.
Tundra Gypsy said:
I tried to plant some peppermint one year and discovered how invasive it was!! I had it in a raised bed, and it wandered off in all directions; even went under the box and showed up in the walkway. Same thing with Lemon Balm; it wanted to take over my garden bed.
I guess they need to be in another part of the yard and away from my garden. Any thoughts as to what to do? I had horseradish in a black pot, and it escaped down through a drain hole and into a bed. Now I have a ton of horseradish, but it is still in that one area, away from the main garden. whew!
Click to expand...

I used to have a ton of lemon balm and a couple of different types of mint and last year, nada, ditto that on the thistles. I'm not sure what happened but none of it survived last years winter.
 
G

Gingergirl

Veteran Member
packyderms_wife said:
do you know which creeping thyme you planted? I'd like to try this thyme is one of my favorite herbs second only to basil.
Click to expand...

Hi Packy,

I planted it 3 years ago and have long since lost the tag. As best as I can remember, it was a Red Mother of Thyme "Thymus supyllum 'Coccineus' ". The leaves are as fragrant as my French Thyme. I planted it in mulch over landscape fabric. It gets shade from a small plum tree . It doesn't care and has rooted itself an additional couple feet each summer.

Tundra,
I also have a patch of peppermint in partial shade. The shade controls the growth some. I planted it to keep the mice out of my house. Very successful.
 
Freeholder

Freeholder

This too shall pass.
We can't grow it here, but farther south, there's Yaupon Holly, which is supposed to make a very good tea. It's got a really bad Latin name (Ilex vomitoria), but the people who vomited from it had drunk gallons of the stuff. Even water could cause vomiting at that rate, LOL! It will grow much further north than Camellia sinensis tea, and David the Good says he actually likes the Yaupon holly tea better.

I like to plant mints under a leaky faucet! They like lots of water. At the edge of a wet area is good for them, too. If you are in town and have sidewalks, you could fill in the space between sidewalk and street with mints and other useful low-growing species, and not have to worry about them taking over your yard.

Kathleen
 
W

Weft and Warp

Senior Member
Tundra Gypsy said:
I tried to plant some peppermint one year and discovered how invasive it was!! I had it in a raised bed, and it wandered off in all directions; even went under the box and showed up in the walkway. Same thing with Lemon Balm; it wanted to take over my garden bed.
I guess they need to be in another part of the yard and away from my garden. Any thoughts as to what to do? I had horseradish in a black pot, and it escaped down through a drain hole and into a bed. Now I have a ton of horseradish, but it is still in that one area, away from the main garden. whew!
Click to expand...

I learned that lesson too!
What I do now is this: drill drainage holes in the bottom of a five gallon bucket, bury it in the ground and plant the mint in the bucket. Your mint will not spread and take over the garden if you plant it this way.
 
M

Martinhouse

Deceased
Freeholder, I heard somewhere a long time ago that one should not use plants growing along a roadside, because of how near they are to toxic exhaust fumes. There was no mention of the exhaust affecting the flavor of the plants.

After we heard this, my mom and I stopped gathering the red clover that grew along our mile or so of roadside. We dug some up and planted it in our yards so it could grow a new batch of cleaner plants. Which it did. This was well over twenty years ago and to this day some still grows here and there in my yard and gardens!
 
Freeholder

Freeholder

This too shall pass.
Martinhouse said:
Freeholder, I heard somewhere a long time ago that one should not use plants growing along a roadside, because of how near they are to toxic exhaust fumes. There was no mention of the exhaust affecting the flavor of the plants.

After we heard this, my mom and I stopped gathering the red clover that grew along our mile or so of roadside. We dug some up and planted it in our yards so it could grow a new batch of cleaner plants. Which it did. This was well over twenty years ago and to this day some still grows here and there in my yard and gardens!
Click to expand...

I've heard that too, but I'm not sure it's a problem anymore, since gasoline no longer has lead in it. Does anyone know? In any case, if you are only picking new leaves, it shouldn't be a problem, as they wouldn't have been exposed for very long. Also, a really busy road would be more of a concern than a fairly quiet one.

Kathleen
 
M

moldy

Veteran Member
You would still get the runoff from oil and tires from the road. Not saying you can't, but if you have a choice, further from the road is better.
 
TerriHaute

TerriHaute

Hoosier Gardener
Lemon balm is in the mint family and also makes a very nice tea. Dr. Berg (the keto doc on YouTube) recently recommended lemon balm tea as a good stress/anxiety reducer. It spreads like crazy, mostly by seed. I have been pulling it out of my herb beds like weeds, but I am going to find a better home for it and start harvesting and drying it this year.
 
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