English Mint ...in a Mediterranean climate!

[pambon]

Can someone please tell me why delicious English mint, smells SO minty (!), grows in a strange way out here!!

Each stem quickly becomes almost tree-like and I'm having trouble propagating it as the thick woody cuttings don't want to root in water.

Have just taken possession this morning of two pots of mint, simple bunches of which were brought over by friends in the last week of August and potted up for me. Even they commented on how 'its' growing differently here than it does in England'

Help please!

PS I do not have green fingers...definitely very black

[Mouse]

Oh how strange Pambon!

Do you regularly pinch out the shoots? This helps to make it more bushy and stops it becoming leggy.

Mouse
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[pambon]

No Mouse, should I?

[Jimbo]

I'm guessing, but I'd imagine that it doesn't like your high temperatures. English mint - unlike other mint family members like thyme, basil, oregano, rosemary and lavender, which are staples of Mediterranean regions - is probably adapted to the cooler and wetter English climate. We have a woolley-leaved and highly-aromatic mint growing happily here but it's in a shaded location, close to our stream. And we're cooler.

Jim

[Mouse]

Definately! You'll see a difference. If you pinch out the tiny leaves as they start to come through at the top you then encourage the plant to send out more side shoots - hence it becoming bushier.
It also encourages the roots to grow outwards too instead of downwards.
Start to do this as soon as the plant is established...and keep doing it.

In the old days all herbs were used daily and so didn't need pinching out as the constant harvesting served as a pruning device.

Mind you my mint doesn't get much chance to get leggy...given that I love mojitos so much!

Mouse
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