Thank you! (Other than mint . . .)

[Glenna Rose]

Thank you for all the wonderful suggestions, some I had thought of but others were new ideas. This group is so great!

In my searching, I found this web page which has likely been posted here before but I'll post it again. This particular page at the site is specifically about sun herbs.

Farms opened their greenhouse yesterday so I made my first trip there the first day. I limited myself to one berry flat of plants because I tend to go a bit overboard on the first trip. The limit was because the garden isn't rototilled yet.

I bought: Pink Top Agastache (for the butterflies and hummingbirds as well as bees) Dukat Dill (should be pretty as well as good for the bees, and later birds) French Tarragon (which I'll put in my herb garden and starts slips to transplant) English Thyme (which I'll put in my herb garden and starts slips to transplant) Sweet Woodruff (got two of those on recommendation though tag says part-shade so will put only one out there) Tricolor Sage Golden Sage Lavendar Blue Star Chinese Lantern Pennyroyal (bought three but will put only one out there and see how it does in full sun) And one Sun Gold tomato plant just because I had to buy at least one tomato!

---------------- [e-mail] writes:

>135 ft. long??? >Man! Many folks would give their eye teeth for that much space!

I wish it was in a location that wouldn't be accessible to passing male dogs! There are many things I would love to plant there. In 2002, I put a lot of my "mystery" tomato plants out there and had neighborhood children adopt them. I put signs with the child's name on the ones that belonged to someone with the others having a sign that said they were for everyone to pick. They were very popular. The children were, of course, cautioned to take the tomatoes home to wash them before they ate them, and, surprisingly, they did! Cool. The following year, the chickens had cleaned out the seeds in the garden so there were very few volunteers to plant elsewhere so I didn't do it last year.

> >I'd put in a variety of herbs in that strip! > >The ones that I have that crowd out weeds really well are Oregano, >Creeping thyme, Dittany of crete, and prostrate rosemary.

Unfortunately, Millennium's creep>

You'd make some four-footed friends if you included catmint. :)

LOL. I'm trying to discourage cats coming around though I'd love to plant some other than in the pot in the tree.

> >Along with what has already been mentioned, I have yarrow, chamomile and >lemon >balm in my herb garden. They naturalize nicely.

Thank you, Julie. I have some Lem>Several of the artemesias (eg. Silver King, Silver Queen) will spread.

They're not edible but are great for making wreaths. Anise hyssop >will self-seed and fill in nicely. It's good for cooking and teas and >bees. Lemon balm will spread and self-seed, but will be happier in >part shade.

Thank you, Dianna. The Lem>

catnip (self-seeds _profusely_)(the blue-flowered Nepeta grandiflora is > a much worse spreader than the true catnip Nepeta cataria) >hyssop (self-seeds _profusely_) >oregano (self-seeds _profusely_) >California poppy (self-seeds _profusely_) >Mentha longifolia (comes true from seed, spreads by root runners, and is > pretty, too.) >Artemisia ludoviciana (currently trying to conquer the world from my > doorstep; not by self-seeding but by root runners) >elecampane (self-seeds, but isn't as fast to spread as the others. This > one gets very very tall, in flower. Pretty leaves, too.) >mullein (biennial, doesn't spread as fast as the rest, but it's still in > the top 10 in my garden) >motherwort (self-seeds _profusely_, gets rather tall) >ground-ivy (ground cover that spreads by root runners) >musk mallow (self-seeds _profusely_) >caraway (biennial, self-seeds, once it's established you'll have lots of > it.) >Add a potentilla or two and you're pretty much set.

Thank you, Henriette. There are a lot of really good suggesti>

Various thymes! Creeping thymes, wooly thyme is a common one that >will take the heat and dry areas. Oregano.. there are culinary Greek >Oregano which is kind of dry but hot and peppery in flavor, there are >also other "ornamental" oreganos like Golden, that are not culinary, >they just taste like grass. You could use some bush type thymes in >some areas too.. there are lemon thymes in both creeping and bush >types, usually green with yellow edged leaves, an there are silver >thymes.. green with white edges.. there are scads of different ones! >Feel free to become obsessed with thyme ;-) >

It sounds like thyme (and oregano) are going to be the backbone of the strip. I have several different ones in my herb garden now and will definitely try to make starts from what I have.

Wooly Thyme wasn't ready yet either. :-(

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>thyme, oregano, lemon balm all form dense groundcovers which do not >let anything else grow.

With all the suggestions about these, I'm seriously thinking of expanding those to the parking strip next year if this works out. It would sure reduce the mowing!

Given that you have that much space, I would >consider some perennial >edible, including asparagus, sorrel, horseradish, and raspberry.

I'd love to grow asparagus there, it would certa>

I'll second the thyme and oregano, but throw in a couple of >clumps of chives. You'll never use them all, but they sure are >good when fresh, and they're pretty when they bloom.

The chives are a wonderful idea! I love to see them bloom. Since I have plenty in the herb garden, these can bloom away and spread to their hearts' content. :-)

> >Rosemary will spread quite well also.

I was concerned Rosemary would get too high, but someone else suggested prostrate Rosemary so I'll try that. In the meantime, I might make some starts and plant the taller varieties and move it to another area as it gets larger in another couple of years. I've long considered a Rosemary and Lavender hedge along the fish pond; this would be a good way to start it until the arborvitae is completely out of that location.

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I'd love to be able to sow Thyme seeds out there but I tried it last year beside my storage shed and not a single plant from three packages of seeds! (All came from Shumway so I'm not sure if it was me, the location or possibly bad seeds.) It doesn't seem like I have even a slightly green thumb. It only goes to verify what I say about my garden . . . it grows in spite of me, not because of me.

Thank you, again, everyone, for all the wonderful ideas!

Glenna

[simy1]

Given that asparagus is out, and raspberry is probably taking too much space, you could still consider sorrel and horseradish. Both are very aggressive weeds, even though they don't blanket the ground. Right now (Zone 5.5) I am enjoying the abundant, early production of sorrel leaves (making lots of sorrel soup), which at the end of the winter is just perfect for a tired body. And it takes absolutely no work except cutting the leaves. Sorrel also goes well in many summer soups, like tomato-corn or ratatouille. Horseradish, of course, you have to like it to plant it, but young leaves less than three inches are a good salad green (mild tasting, just a hint of hot). They will be up in 15 days here.

[Larry Blanchard]

Fair warning - sage can grow into quite a large bush with some very strong and widely spread roots. DAMHIKT :-).

Just a thought. After suggesting the thyme, I remembered thrift, which has been described as "chives without the smell". Since you already have enough chives, that's a similar alternative. And it comes in dwarf as well as ordinary.

[Larry Blanchard]

Oops - that should have been "After suggesting the chives...".

[Anonymous]

In times past, paghat was a prolific poster to this newsgroup. You could probably Google the archives and find dozens of her posts ... including a couple arguments with me. :-) Bill