I'm sure this has been covered before, but I can't find anything recent. The Peppermint Pattie being my favorite candy in all the world, I'd like to grow chocolate mint. Before I do (since I already have spearmint, peppermint, catnip (okay, it's not mentha, but...) and pennyroyal), what are the experiences with chocolate mint? Is it a waste of soil? Or would you die without it? (LOL)
Thanks!
Ann
chocolate mint
I've got a few small patches of chocolate mint around the house and I love it! But then again, I don't mind mint kind of wandering freely... Lots of mine ends up in the lawn where it gets mown by DH. We both love the smell when we step on it. I've found it to be a very strong scented mint (kinda chocolatey I suppose, but then again, many just smell like "mint" to me) as compared with some of the others I've had. Definitely much better smelling than catnip :-) Chocolate mint and curly mint are the only two mints that I encourage to spread all over to their hearts' content. Curly because it's pretty until everything else grows and catches up later in the season and chocolate because I love the smell and it's very step-on-able. I'm in a very different zone than you, so hopefully someone from closer to home will chime in! Not sure if my comment is helpful to you, but it's my 2 cents :-)
I have it and LOVE it! I keep all of my mints in separate containers in the ground so they won't spread. The chocolate mint is just wonderful! I can try and send you a few sprigs if you'd like. Just let me know. I also have Apple, Margarita, & Orange mints (and a few more I can't remember!) Catnip - I couldn't get rid it. It was wild!
Margarita mint?? I've not heard of that type before! What does it smell like? What does it look like? Can you use it for anything? Have any pictures? :-)
Thanks to both of you! Gardengirl, did you see the "new herb garden" thread? She's planted in flue liners, and it looks terrific. I'd be more than happy to send you postage or trade for the sprigs. I know there's no guarantee it will grow, but I seem to be pretty lucky with the other mints.
I'll definitely get the chocolate mint, maybe use it as a partial ground cover, Calypsa! One of the best things about gardening to me is the smells. I used to stay on my uncle's farm in Missouri, and it wasn't until I started growing my own herbs that I realized what grew wild up there. I was holding a new sage and a new mint, and the vision of the yard there overwhelmed me, smelling them together. Maybe I'll create the same kind of memories for my granddaughter.
Thanks! GG, I'll d-mail you.
Ann
Ann, I've got a bed that's overflowing with chocolate mint, so if GG doesn't get you set up, LMK. :-) It's a good ground cover, but it does spread vigorously!
I went to the elementary school this morning to talk to my young friend Penina's class (she's my best garden helper on the block... DH calls her my Paduon Learner, a la George Lucas). I took along sprigs of 10 different mints to sniff & taste & talk about, and almost every kids favorite "yummy" choice was the Chocolate Peppermint. Fortunately, that's the one I picked for them to propagate (did I mention I have a lot of it?), so they were very excited. Now there's a tray in the classroom with 25 cups of water with 25 sprigs of Chocolate Peppermint, very carefully stripped of their lower leaves. Next week, I'm returning with potting soil so we can replace the water in the cups with dirt... More fun!
Critter, how fun to share it with kids. When my granddaughter gets to that point, maybe I can be the visiting gardener, too. It looks like GG can set me up, but I'll let you know.
thanks!
I'll be curious to know if you have luck with it. I planted chocolate mint in a large pot last spring. It smelled wonderful. The heat did it in. At least I think it was the heat. Peppermint, spearmint, orangemint and lemon mint all came back this spring but no chocolate. Good luck... pod
Well, TX is hotter than here.... but mine thrives alongside my driveway, which gets pretty hot & dry.
Critter, do you root them in Water? Just water? Does it take long to root? Would you like to trade some mint for leaf pots with babies? I have many Avleaves with babies.
Just water! Mints often start rooting in just a few days. I'm hoping the students will see roots on theirs by the end of the week! :-)
I've got more Chocolate Peppermint than I know what to do with, and I'm sure the Kentucky Colonel Spearmint will soon come up thickly in my newly tilled bed by the deck (it comes back every year after tilling). I'm propagating my newer mints by layering them in fairly big pots right now... I'll have starts of them available down the road though. I may be able to take a few cuttings sooner, but I have to get caught up on other trades first.
I'll be happy to share some mints with you, Spider.... but my AV shelves are pretty darn full right now, so I don't need any more leaf pots, but I appreciate the offer! Let me get caught up, and give me a Dmail bump in a few weeks about the mints.... I can at least get the spearmint & chocolate peppermint to you, probably in a BE if the weather hasn't gotten way too hot, and I'll see about starts of the others. Maybe we can just do a mint swap later in the summer... didn't I just see you posting about having 12 kinds of mint?? That's about the number I have now, I think, and I'll bet our little collections aren't identical. :-)
Hi Critter!
Thank you for your message.
I got 12 kinds of mints last week from blossom farm. They are very small plants. do you think they would grow enough for a fall trade? If so, I am interested.
I have orange, lavender, spearmint,jamaican, banana,lemon,lime, basil, pear,peppermint,apple and pineapple.
I got small plants last year from Fragrant Fields. They overwintered all right in fairly small (6-8 inch) pots, and now they are in 12 inch pots and starting to put on some good growth. Yours might grow faster in a container of moist potting mix than in the ground, but in either case I'll bet we can put together a fun little trade in fall.
I've got orange mint too, and also Jesse's Sweet Pear, Julia's Sweet Citrus, Hillary's Sweet Lemon, Oregano Thyme Mint, Jim's Candy Lemon Lime (growing very slowly), Curly Mint (doublemint flavor), Wild Berry, Marshmallow Mint, Pink Candy Pops, and the aforementioned Chocolate Peppermint & Kentucky Colonel Spearmint.
WOW! What a great selection!
If I get enough to trade, put me down for it.
Sure... I'd be especially interested in your lavender & banana mints!
Chocolate mint now very happy in a pot on the patio, thanks to GardenGirl. As soon as I can get some raised beds made, I'll put it in there and get a picture. And by gone-y as my Uncle Dode used to say, it smells just like a Peppermint Pattie! I'm thinking homemade ice cream in a few weeks...
All mints require shade for me from now till, hhmmm, maybe late Oct? lol
Mmm, I just got some chocolate mint, and it DOES smell heavenly. I was going to put it in a container. I never thought of it as a ground cover. I just may have to find a place where I can step on it!
I also got pineapple mint, candymint, and grapefruit mint. It was hard to limit myself this year, but I was on a budget. :( So many choices!
It makes a very nice ground cover -- and you can mow it, too, as long as you don't repeatedly cut it super short. I've got some in the little strip next to the driveway, and I just take a weed wacker to it every so often (especially if it tries to flower, since I don't want it flinging seeds all over the neighbor's lawn). Talk about smelling mint all over the neighborhood! Just remember that it can spread pretty aggressively.
I mostly go for plain old spearmint, but I have a friend who has horses and who loves chocolate mint. She does not garden which is probably just as well because she lives in the heart of a dense forest at 8400 ft.
So I bought her endless little pots of chocolate mint which always died after a while. Finally I got smart and rooted a piece from one of her chocolate mint plants. I keep it in a large flower pot and pick her some every time I go to her house for manure. It is a great trade -- chocolate mint for a truckload of horse manure and her help shoveling it.
WHAT A DEAL! Maybe I can find some horser around here who'd do the same thing. Of course, as I drive a little Toyota I'd have to make some adjustments to the plan...
I'm thinking I can put some between the stepping stones in the little walkway to the hose. It's not an area that gets regularly mowed since there's not as much grass there, and it's with some of my roses and other perennials. The plant I purchased has a number of good shoots for rooting, I think. I'll have to give that a try.
Thanks
Flowering mints attract all kinds of butterflies.
ANN ... what's the Pennyroyal used for? I got a big pot of it, and the tag said Mentha. I just bought it cause it is a runner, I didnt know it is really a mint.
WOW Critt! you really got a collection of mints!
Quoting:
Jesse's Sweet Pear, Julia's Sweet Citrus, Hillary's Sweet Lemon, Oregano Thyme Mint
Where did you buy these?
Sylvia
Most of these were ordered from Fragrant Fields. See this thread for a discount offer they did for us last year -- I wonder if they'd be willing to do it again?? http://davesgarden.com/forums/t/518126/
The Chocolate Mint, Kentucky Colonel Spearmint, and Curly Mint came from DeBaggio in VA (unfortunately, he doesn't ship).
My mint pots are all doing well, and I might take some cuttings as well to root in water. When the pots are full, I plan to divide them (they're 12 inch pots) and put at least half of the mint from each pot out in our little home orchard. Then I'll let the pots fill in again. Mints are generally pretty vigorous, especially when they're in nice potting mix and watered regularly, so I'm sure I'll have some available for trading down the line.
My pots are sitting along one side of my deck landing... but you sure could put them in the ground. I started them in smaller pots, but I don't think mints are fussy that way. Once your babies have at least enough roots to fill a 2 inch pot, you could plant them in a big pot the same way you could plant them in the ground at that point.
Wish me luck... I am getting moist potting mix into bags, poking holes into plastic cups, etc. I dug up a bunch of little Chocolate Peppermint starts this morning as a backup for the ones that the kids have been rooting, and I'm heading over to the elementary school in a big to help pot them all up! Fun! I think I'll clip some lavender and some scented geranium on my way out too.... they're really into the different scents of things!
We had a great time! I went over prepared to set up a potting station on each of the 5 tables their desks are arranged in, but the teacher thought it would limit the mess to use some tables at the front of the room. So my friend Valerie and I had 10 kids at a time up front, and the rest of the students went to the rear of the room to read a story together. In half an hour, 25 cups were filled with potting mix and mints! It was fun to see the kids, talk a little again about the plants, and answer some questions.
Since the cuttings got left in the dark their first week, they had only just started striking week roots, and I wanted more assurance of success than that. So, this morning I went out and pulled up some mint, cutting it into small, well rooted pieces. I also cut up some sections of rooted runners, and I told them about how my spearmint comes back all over the bed each year after being tilled into bits. Each pot got a piece of rooted plant, a chunk of rooted runner, and a barely rooted cutting. I think one of those at least should take!
They're taking their mints home today, and they're quite excited about them! We talked about planting the starts in a pot or out in the garden, and I made sure they know about how mints can spread and that they should check with their parents before planting the mint out in the yard, LOL. We also talked about pinching the tops off to harvest the mint and to make it get nice & bushy. I think they are envisioning monster plants growing in record time!
what a lovely lesson to teach Critter!
When on Earth is school out there? That would be a great end of year (last week fun thing to do) activity.
I'm in middle school education here--they are too cool for plants. Or at least they think so.
Debbie
Debbie, you should talk to ZZtopsoil... he's got his students (high school, I think) very involved in plants! They grow a bunch from seed each year for a big sale event in spring. But I know what you mean... when I was teaching at the environmental ed center (coastal GA), I think 4-5th grade was my favorite age... they already know a bunch of stuff, they ask good questions, and they are not yet "too cool" to get excited about stuff (especially if it's good & messy).
Last day of school here is Monday, go figure. I think all the classes are just coasting this week & having fun.
High school easier--elementary easier--middle school nothing but anger and hormones...lol
Debbie, my first year of teaching was 9th grade, at a little private school down in GA, so I have some idea! I also taught a senior physics course. LOL, teaching algebra & physics with a background in biology & English lit definitely came under the heading of "Hey, it's a job!" Actually, I think I was probably a better physics teacher because learning physics was so difficult for me that I generally had 3 or 4 different explanations to try.... if you ever had a teacher for whom something (like math) came so easily that it was just "obvious" to them how to do things, you know that the math geniuses aren't necessarily the best math teachers.
Well, we got a little off the topic of chocolate mint, there!
:-)
but this is so interesting... :o)
I attempt to teach them chemistry and physics...lol....not much of anything is learned in May.
Sylvia, pennyroyal is said to keep fleas away, and an infusion is made for general health. As it is an emmenagogue (sp?) (brings on menstruation) it could be dangerous to pregnant women. I just love the smell, hope it keeps fleas away, and am thinking of finding some statue to put it on top of so it will look like hair. It needs LOTS of water.