Great for paving ideas as you can grow it between paving where it will release its lovely scent when trodden on. The deep pink flowers are highly attractive to bees. This is an excellent choice for a thyme carpet and forms a flat mat of glossy leaves. Keep an eye on the soil though to make sure it doesn't dry out. This grows happily in pots for years but will do equally well in the garden. It's a great option as one of the best edging plants for a path too. When deadheaded and trimmed back after flowering it quickly leafs up then flowers again. It flowers much earlier than other thyme varieties and for longer. This is good for the kitchen and has a lovely taste. Keep snipping the leaves for culinary use and to keep the plant tidy. With a lovely citrusy scent and transformative powers when it comes to adding it to your cooking, this is a firm favourite. Or try lemon and orange scented thyme varieties, or even thyme fragranced with caraway. You can also get variegated varieties where the leaves are shot through with silver or gold. There is a huge variety of thyme plants to choose from including the common garden variety (thymus vulgaris) with its pretty dark green foliage and mauve flowers. Here are more details on growing, harvesting, and using thyme.(Image credit: Jonathan Buckley/Sarah Raven) I love this 12-herb set of non-GMO seeds, which includes thyme, or try an heirloom variety. Plus, you can be sure your plants were grown without chemicals. However, if you’re short on cash and don’t want to buy seedlings, growing from seed is easy. Ready to get growing?Īs a perennial herb, starting it from seed is a slow practice. The roots have a deep, fibrous growth habit that is perfect for growing on erosion-prone slopes. Imagine my surprise when I dug it up and discovered its 2-foot-deep roots (see picture above)! I decided to move a one-year-old plant to a different part of the garden.
Recently, I discovered how this herb can reduce erosion quite by accident! Reducing soil erosion is an important goal in our gardens and landscapes, since we export 3 tons of topsoil per acre per year in America alone. Mmmm.įor something different, try making calendula and thyme shortbread cookies or black cherry preserves with thyme. It is popularly used in a dried poultry herb blend or in herbes de provence seasoning blend. This mediterranean herb can be used both fresh and dried in the kitchen. Would you like to grow food in your front yard without sacrificing curb appeal? Check out my ebook, The Permaculture Inspired Edible Landscape.
Or try making your own thyme infused oil (from Herbal Academy), which can be used as a culinary oil in the kitchen, directly on the skin as a moisturizer or disinfecting ointment, or in a salve.įor all of these reasons, it is one of my favorite herbs to grow in the medicine garden. You can buy the essential oil or look for natural products with the active ingredient thymol in it. It is also a strong antiseptic for cuts, scrapes, acne or sore muscles. Check out my sage and thyme elixir, which is easy to make at home. As an antiviral herb, it is especially helpful with common cold symptoms, coughs, and bronchial infections. Otherwise, cut the woody stems back by half each fall.
Harvest it often to keep it naturally pruned. I gravitate toward plants that don’t need much attention, how about you? The following are some of the benefits you’ll get from growing it in your herb garden. Whether you like creeping thyme, common (English) thyme, lemon thyme or French thyme, you will find a variety to suit your needs. This mediterranean plant is in the mint family. But that’s not all! Check out these six reasons to grow thyme in your herb garden. Thyme is a valuable herb with culinary and medicinal benefits.