Growing Thyme in Your Herb Garden

Call me crazy, but if you don’t have thyme growing in your garden you cannot call the place an herb garden.  It is one of the most essential and beneficial herbs around.  It does not hurt that there are over a hundred special varieties with tempting flavors and aromas.

All of the varieties of thyme have similar attributes including leaves shaped like ovals and a twig like, woody stem.  In early summer or late spring, based on your climate, your plant will blossom with small pink, purple or pale white colored blooms.

Among the many varieties, here are a few you will probably want to be familiar with:

• Common Thyme: When you purchase thyme at the grocery store, this is the variety that you will generally be getting.  It’s a little taller variety that also has a bold flavor and aroma, which makes it great for your dishes.  You can check out the leaves of this vaiety of thyme to figure out which of the following 3 kinds it is.  You can find that the French type has thin leaves as opposed to the German which has broad leaves, and then there is the English variety which has variegated leaves.

• Lemon Thyme: You’ll never guess what lemon thyme smells like.  If you cannot tell that that one out you might want to choose another hobby.  You cannot mistake the scent of lemon that emanates from lemon thyme.  Some varieties of lemon thyme even have tiny pale yellow flowers.

• Wild Thyme: People wrongly think that all kinds of thyme are identical, but you will not usually find wild thyme being used in cooking.  If you are seeking an unusual ground cover, this is a good starting point.

Using thyme is not hard, just snip off a few leaves, dice them if necessary and throw them in with your recipe.  In order to assist your herb grow well; make sure to trim it often which will give you lots of opportunities to use the leaves in making yummy meals.  This herb is also used in health and beauty products that you can make at home.  You can use thyme in soaps and lotions, toss a small bit in your bathwater or use it to make an sweet smelling potpourri.

The old folks will tell you to use it to help with several different ailments including sleeplessness, gas, asthmatic breathing, headaches, poor digestion and coughing.  It seems like thyme does everything but dust the furniture.

Cultivating thyme is easy.  It will succeed indoors or outdoors and thrives in well-drained, rich dirt and full-sun.  Because it takes a long time to germinate your plant (a long thyme), I suggest that you drive down to the home improvement store and buy a few plants for your garden.  For your outside thyme, try it in your rock garden or along a stone wall or over a rustic driveway.

If you don’t want to bother with taking your plant in for the winter, you can dry it by cutting off each branch at the stem and hanging it upside down.

It’s always a sensible idea to keep the seeds from your thyme plant.  Believe it or not, your thyme can still be used in germination up to three years later.

Good luck with your herb gardening. Be sure to let me know how your herb garden grows.

Here is more information on Herb Garden Plants. Here is a website with a free mini-course dedicated to Herb Gardens.

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