oops. I let the italian flowering oregano go to seed at the end of the season last year. Now I have many little guys popping up everywhere in the herb bed. I didn't realize it would be so prolific in my zone.
Oregano self seeding
You know is funny you say that, I was cleaning my bed yesterday and under all the fallen leaves i found my greek oregano plant and all its not so tiny branches had rooted all around the plant pretty much like a weed.
No need to say that i ripped all of them little roots and left the mother plant. I didnt even know that oregano plant was going to survive winter let alone reproduce! I have to admit it smells good though...
~Soris
Oregano is a very sturdy plant. Even in Michigan, it will overwinter outdoors. Overwinters even better when mulched by fallen leaves. LOL
I was delighted to find my greek oregano hiding under last years tomato debris! And, in the desert, it's easy to stop - where I don't water, it won't grow :-) Mine didn't show any inclination to bloom last year. It's in partial shade, so maybe it won't?
Odd this thread surfaced again. Yesterday I noticed a different foliage growing in a pot of scullcap. I am a toucher and smeller. I rubbed the foliage to find it smelling wonderful ~ it is oregano. LOL
Right now, the Marjoram is in bloom. It overwinters outside too.
My Greek oregano has never spread much,at least not like the mints.I think here it's too wet for the seeds to lay dormant all winter.The roots aren't too invasive-easy to control.
Right after we moved into this house I got 2 oregano plants. Didn't have the garden ready, so I potted them up in about 12 inch pots where they sort of languished the first year (they were too shaded by the HUGE basil). They died back to nothing in the winter, and I figured they were goners. The next year (last year) they bounced back in their pots. I was still working on putting in beds and planning where things would go, and they got overlooked again. They sat in their pots and were lucky if I remembered to slosh some water on them. This year I had a place for them, and when I went to get them I had to cut the pots off and trim about 9 inches of roots that had grown through the holes in the bottom of the pots. These are tough plants! The two of them now have a section of the bed that's all theirs, and they're thriving.
The question I have has to do with the old branches. Even here in Savannah it gets cold enough so it dies back (at least it did in the pots). Should I clip everything back down to the ground, or does it grow from the seemingly dead stalks, like thyme?
And my second question has to do with drying oregano. Probably the best place for me to dry it is in my closet, which is dark and certainly more temperate than the garage. Should I dry the branches and then take the leaves off, or should I take the leaves off first and dry them? Yep, I'm a REAL newbie at this drying stuff! Any help will be gratefully received.
If it overwintered in our 8*F winter last winter, it should certainly overwinter in Savannah (I MISS Georgia - I used to live off of Henry Street - oh, the dogwoods and azaleas in the spring!). I figured mine would be gonners so I just threw dead tomato plants in that bed to about 1 ft deep as I didn't have a compost pile yet. I didn't cut back anything. They were pretty crunchy brown in spots, but when I uncovered them and started watering them, they bounced right back. They get a little tinged with brown edges from time to time as we still aren't past our last hard frost yet, but they are putting out new growth like crazy. I like tough plants!
Good luck drying anything in Savannah in the summer? If I recall, it was so humid during some parts of the year that it would rain at sunset every day when the air cooled and the water just condensed out of the air. You might need to use an actual dehydrator... I don't know about oregano, but basil freezes well - either in ice cubes or lightly coated in olive oil.
I don't know if mine will survive the desert sun, but some of it is now creaping out of the shade and moseying into the sunlight. As we're still only in the high 70's, low 80's (and yes, 30 at night), it seems to be doing ok... but I'm worried about it when it gets to 108. Did good in the semi-shade at those temps last year - if it does good in the sun with temps like that, I'm going to plant it everywhere!
Kmom ~ tell me how you use the olive oil prior to freezing please?
Paul James from Gardening by the Yard had a great suggestion for drying herbs. Cars get hot on sunny days. He took some newspaper, placed the herbs on the back seat of the car on the newspaper and closed the door. Of course, be sure the windows are rolled up. Forget about it for a while and when you come back the herbs are perfectly dried....and your car smells great too!
I had heard of drying herbs and flowers in the dark of the trunk before.
Freezing basil in olive oil:
I keep a little ziplock bag of olive oil in the freezer as I figure I shouldn't pour it back in the bottle...
1. Strip leaves from the stems, rinse and dry basil on paper towels
2. Put in bag of olive oil so bag is about 1/3 full and capture as much air as possible in the bag so it is "poofy"
3. Gently shake to coat all sides of all the basil leaves
4. Transfer leaves to a ziplock bag of previously treated and still frozen bag of basil
I use a gallon size bag that accumulates extra basil all summer long and a few more when it's time to "rip out all the basil" at the end of the year. Through the winter I just snap off a bit of basil from the "clump" that eventually forms in the bag and add it to whatever. (I figure, if it needs basil, it must need a bit of olive oil, right?) Basil keeps its color and flavor this way, but if you let it thaw before using, sometimes it gets "mushy".
Sweet Dani lemon basil did not seem to hold its flavor this way. I didn't plant enough Mrs. Burns lemon basil to experiment with.
What a great way to preserve it. In my mind, I am visualizing oregano & marjoram in olive oil too. Thanks!
growing up with an Italian mom and grandma, I can say without a doubt that where there is basil, there is olive oil! :o) LOL
Thanks, kmom! I'm definitely using your olive oil method for freezing my basil this year!
Me too. Sounds ever so much better than drying it.
I like Mrs. Burns better than Dani. I have some coming along now and will also try it with the olive oil. I am growing large leaf, too.