Gardening : An Herb Fancier’s Catnip
Whether grown for culinary, medicinal or ornamental purposes, herbs are a hot item on the gardening scene, as they have been for the last 10 years. And nowhere in Southern California can one view, purchase or learn about herbs better than at Taylor’s Herb Gardens in Vista.
This 40-year-old firm is recognized throughout the world for its quality and diversified selection of herbs. It is both a retail and a wholesale grower and supplier of herbs, and many Southland nurseries carry its plants.
Although Taylor’s plants can be purchased in local nurseries or even by mail order, herb fanciers in the Vista area will find it a rewarding experience to visit Taylor’s gardens.
Why? Because it is one of the few places in Southern California that maintains extensive herb display gardens where home gardeners can see what the potted herb plant will actually look like when it is fully grown.
The display gardens are truly beautiful, and the herb plants are labeled so that they can be easily identified. In addition, Taylor’s offers an almost astronomical selection of common and rare herb plants and seeds.
A recent visit with Dennis Sharmahd, a designer of edible landscapes at Taylor’s, provided a fascinating array of herbal lore and useful information.
Cats and Catnip
For instance, everyone knows that cats go wild over catnip. According to Sharmahd, this is only true if cats have never been exposed to cat thyme; once they have sampled cat thyme, cats give the cold shoulder to catnip. In fact, to propagate this gray-leaved plant with its lilac flowers, the people at Taylor’s have to cage the young plants to keep the cats out of it. Cats eat it, roll in it and generally go bonkers over it.
On the subject of thyme, in addition to cat thyme, Taylor’s stocks several thyme varieties, including caraway thyme, with leaves that smell and taste like caraway seeds, and lemon-scented thyme, which is becoming a popular addition to salads, cookies and teas.
Among herbs that have grown in popularity recently are the scented geraniums with their fragrant scented leaves, which are used for vinegar, flavoring jellies, fruit punch, teas and for fragrance in sachets and potpourri. Included here are geraniums with peppermint, lime, lemon and rose-scented leaves and beautiful flowers.
Sharmahd says that aloe vera plants are among the most popular sellers at the nursery. Some people consider the gel from the leaves as a treatment for minor burns, and keep a pot of aloe vera in the kitchen to soothe burns incurred while cooking.
According to Sharmahd, pennyroyal, a member of the mint family, has become popular with hikers, campers and outdoors enthusiasts who rub the leaves on clothing to repel mosquitoes and flies.
While pennyroyal repels mosquitoes and flies, Mexican bush sage, with its striking purple flowers, attracts whole families of hummingbirds, and bee balm, with its pretty red flowers, are attractive to bees and butterflies.
For beauty and fragrance, it is hard to best the lavenders. They make a beautiful and fragrant addition to a landscape. The sprigs, with their marvelous lavender flowers, make beautiful fresh bouquets and are quite attractive in dried arrangements. Sharmahd said the lavenders are the most popular perfume herb and are becoming increasingly popular for use in potpourri. Taylor’s offers six varieties of lavender.
Sharmahd pointed out that Tricolor society garlic, while not a true garlic, makes a spectacular landscape plant especially when utilized in borders. It has an unusual upright plant habit, grows to about 2 feet in height and has slender green, pink and white leaves and lovely lilac flowers. It is a perennial plant that is easy to grow and almost carefree.
As one might expect, the most popular items at Taylor’s are the culinary herbs, such as basil, rosemary, thyme, oregano, marjoram, parsley, chives, dill and summer savory. However, according to Sharmahd, these herbs needn’t be limited to culinary purposes; most make attractive plants to fit into a landscape scheme. That’s why a visit to the display gardens can be such a valuable experience as one can view these herbs as mature plants.
Planting Time
When to plant the culinary herbs? Sharmahd says that in Southern California, fall is an excellent time to plant rosemary, thyme, oregano, parsley, sage and chives, while spring is the season to plant basil, dill, marjoram and summer savory.
Incidentally, you are not limited to one variety of these popular culinary herbs. Taylor’s carries four varieties of thyme, six varieties of culinary sages, five different rosemarys and several basils.
In addition to the more popular culinary herbs, Taylor’s stocks a large number of lesser known but important culinary herbs, such as burnet, caraway, chervil, coriander, lemon grass, lovage, eight varieties of mint, French sorrel and many others.
Taylor’s Herb Gardens, 1535 Lone Oak Road, Vista, is open from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday and from 8 a.m. to noon on Saturdays; closed Sundays. Visitors are welcome to browse the display gardens during the above hours and there is a guided tour at 11 a.m. on the first Saturday of each month.
Taylor’s Herb Gardens offers a mail-order catalogue of its plants and seeds for $1. It features color photos of many of the herbs, contains various recipes utilizing these herbs and lists seeds for an amazing collection of 182 different herbs.
