Swiss Mint - Boom and Bust Cycle

My swiss mint is now a year old!  But it's not any bigger.  In fact, it's now smaller.  Let me explain.  Initially the mint grew really well.  Look how big the leaves were.  I even managed to prune it several times and grow new plants from cuttings.  I think most of those died months later.  The mother plant survived though, but barely.   

I'm not really sure why but the stems became spindly.  The plant started losing it's leaves and the new leaves that grew were small and a little rusty.  Still the plant survived.   Although, it's been sunny the past two months, the swiss mint still didn't recover completely.   So I decided to change the soil completely.  I figured maybe that would help. 

Since I had some extra vermicompost left from my various bins, I replaced the soil with vermicompost.  A few weeks later, my swiss mint looks small but well on its way to recovery.  Once again the stems are fat and the leaves are big.  I even have an accidental melon growing in the middle.  I think this is actually the most dramatic impact of vermicompost that I've seen among the many times I've used themf for my plants. Will the swiss mint recover for good or is it just teasing me?  We'll see in a couple of months.

By the way, my newly recovered chocolate mint is dying again.  I'll talk about that next time.

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Herb Cuttings Smell Bad

Have you ever tried rooting herbs in a glass of water? I've tried it with a good number of herbs: sweet basil, cinnamon basil, Thai basil, Swiss mint, chocolate mint, Japanese mint, lemon mint, tarragon, rosemary, stevia, lavender, cat's whiskers and some others.

In some cases, it would work. When it does work, I would usually see roots within a week. I don't usually remove a lot of the leaves (you'd usually read something like retain only the top four leaves) so the cuttings generally wilt for a few days without perking up.

If it's been a couple of days and the leaves look fresh, those cuttings will probably root.

In some cases, the leaves start to look wilted or just dry. Chances are, that will not root.

Mint Epidemic

Oh man!  Almost all my mints (Japanese Mint, Chocolate Mint, Lemon Mint, Peppermint and Swiss Mint) are sick across the garden.  Well almost all of them.  My Spearmint (which recently got a vermicompost boost) seems to be the only healthy one.  I think there are two problems.  First of all, the lower leaves of my various mints are drying up.  I'm not certain if it's mint rust.  It looks a little like that.  I'm not sure if it's fungus either.  Early this week, I moved most of my mints to the sunniest part of the garden.  Maybe it'll help dry the soil (I was also wondering if it's root rot).   I just know that my plants generally perform better when out in the full sun.

Here's the other problem.  I think there's a caterpillar infestation again.  They're eating all the mint leaves!  I don't get it though.  How come they're not attacking the Cat's Whiskers.  Among my basil plants, they're attacking the Sweet Basil a lot more than my Cinnamon Basil plants. Anyway, most of my mints (no matter how big) have been stripped clean of leaves!  Argh!!!  It's irritating.   I hope most of them survive this episode.  Sigh.

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Do Mints Self Propagate?

If you read about mint care, you would find consistent advice regarding "containing" mints in pots.  Mints are considered "invasive".  Have you ever wondered how that happens?  Do mints spread?  How?

Well, I recently re-potted my Swiss Mint. If it looks a little small, that's because I virtually decapitated it when I pruned it because I want it grow bushy.  When I removed it from its temporary pot, I saw this.  If you see two almost white stems, those are new growths.  They came straight from the roots.  If you imagine that the plant is underground, you will see these as new sprouts from the ground.  I'm not sure if this is what you call a runner, but it's certainly a sign of self propagation. 

So that's two ways to propagate mint.  You can do it with cuttings.  You can also let it spread on its own.

On the side, do look at my mint collection (and some basil).  They're all in bottles of water and as you can see, there's a long line of them now.   I can't wait until I fill the entire hall with my plants.

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Hydroponic Mint and Foliar Feeding

I finally did it!  I managed to put jargon in my title.  Today, I'll talk about another chapter of my mint adventures.  First of, let me tell you about the multiple varieties I now have:  my original Chocolate and Japanese mint, my Jean donated Peppermint and Lemon Mint, my new Swiss Mint and my Sua donated Spearmint.   Whew!  It's a good thing I've become somehow familiar with their leaf shapes and scents.  Otherwise I'd mix them up.

Does Pruning Make Bushy Mint Plants?

When reading plant care tips, whether herbs of flowering plants, one of the most common tips you'd see is pruning.  You're supposed to pinch, deadhead or prune (all of which are foliage and flower removal) to encourage branching and to make the plant bushier.  I've witnessed that many times in my very short herb caring career.  Today I'll demonstrate it with my Swiss Mint. Barely two weeks old in my garden and it already fell prey to my prunamania (addiction to pruning).  Look at the red circle.  That's where I cut the original stem about a week ago.  Today, a week later, you'd see that leaves are growing on the sides of the cut. In a week or two, it will become apparent that my Swiss Mint is branching out.  Theoretically, you perform that regularly enough, you'll have a bushy plant (lots of branches).  That makes pruning really cool in two respects:  your original plant looks a lot healthier and you get to propagate a lot (naturally you should root and plant the cuttings).

Next time around, I'll show you what regular pruning did to my relatively young Cinnamon Basil over the course of a month and a half. 

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Welcome Swiss Mint!

Hello there!  My garden has a new member.  Say hello to my Swiss Mint!  It smells great.  It joins my growing list of garden mints.  It all started out with my Japanese Mint and Chocolate Mint.  Then, I got some gift Peppermint cuttings from Jean which she followed up with a Lemon Mint (I forgot to welcome my Lemon mint!).  Just before I bought the Swiss Mint yesterday afternoon, my friend Sua gave me a Spearmint cutting (I hope it survives!).  She gave me a Thyme cutting too.  I hope that survives as well.    I can imagine the tea and salad potential of all the mints in my yard.  And when I propagate enough for a cool wedding tokens sideline.  It's exciting!

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