I'd like to grow my own rosehips and lavender for culinary use. Which cultivar of English Lavender do you prefer? Which species and cultivars of Rose do you prefer? (I'd like to start Roses from seeds due to not knowing if bought plants are treated.)
Best Plants for Rosehips & Culinary Lavender?
I like Hidcote lavender for cooking. Hidcote is extremely fragrant (with no camphor overtones). Hidcote is fairly hardy and I can grow it here in zone 5a. For large rosehips, try a rugosa. here are some hips with my thumb in the pic for reference.
Wow, those are some beautiful hips! Is that a named variety of rugosa or just the species? I've been thinking about getting some of the species to make a hedge and get some hips.
Thank you for replying ^_^
I read that Rugosa was good for rose hips flavor wise. I harvested seed from my neighbors Rugosa and am trying to germinate them. I want to order back up seeds though. The hips were so fragrant and my neighbor told me to take as many as I need. I want to have my own plant in case the landscapers start going around spraying all the bushes in the ground.
I will browse around for some Hidcote. We are very fortunate to have some Lavender farms in Washington that I can order plants from.
That's a pic of Rugosa rubra. I have Rugosa alba that produces pretty large hips, but not quite as large as this. I will warn you that Rugosa rubra spreads like wildfire! But, that's okay with us as we have dug up a lot of suckers and planted them around our 5 acres.
That's good to know. I would not mind the suckering at all.