I tend to be a compulsive plant collector. Each year I often focus on just one plant group. Approximately ten years ago, I fell in love with the mints because I loved the scent of their leaves and using them in teas. During that summer I spent many hours on the road visiting every garden center in the mid-Michigan area that sold herbs. I bought one of each mint variety that I found. This must be the worst gardening mistake I’ve ever made! I had pineapple mint (variegated leaves), spearmint, peppermint, orange mint, citrus mint, lemon mint, Kentucky Colonel mint (reputed to be best tea mint according to the garden center’s owner), and chocolate mint.

Each mint received its own special place in the garden that summer. They were carefully planted in between my perennials. Unfortunately, no one had warned me that mint has a secret mission – taking over the world! I was thrilled with the growth of these lovely plants that first summer and even enjoyed pruning them because my hands smelled of mint afterward. Their leaves flavored many cups of teas for me.

The next spring I discovered that the spearmint and peppermint had succeeded in galloping across my 30 foot long perennial bed. I spent many an afternoon pulling up plants with several feet of rhizomes attached to them. These rhizomes seemed to grow faster than I could weed. Those rhizomes sent up plants that managed to grow in places that no self-respecting plant should have been willing to grow. Of course, if you are still attached to the mother plant, you can grow in virtually any soil or even in a pile of rocks because you are getting part of your nutrition from the mother plant. That summer I began trying to limit the growth of these plants. Just this spring, noticed some tiny plants still managing to appear in the old garden.

I absolutely loved the variegated pineapple mint for its coloration and its scent. Unfortunately, the taste disappointed me. Since I ignored it after the first summer, this particular mint managed to colonize the back edge of a 30 foot border by growing right up next to the foundation wall and hiding itself behind other taller growing plants. That plant didn’t disappear from my garden until the day a maintenance man took his front end loader to my former garden. I am surprised mint plants aren’t growing up through the new lawn now growing in that former garden bed!

The only well behaved mints I ever owned were the orange, apple, and chocolate mints. None of these proved reliably hardy in my zone 5 climate. I still would love a large container or even a garden border filled with chocolate mint because it had the distinct taste of Yorkshire peppermint patties. Some of the local children knocked at my door on a regular basis asking to have a piece of my “candy plant.” I could enjoy the taste without the calories of the real candy.

Gardening Tips

Only a few other plants have proved to be as invasive as those plants from the mint (Mentha) genus. If you want to avoid having mints totally take over your herb garden in a few short years, I advise you to grown them in deep containers that reach halfway to the other side of the globe. Some gardeners like to cut off the bottom of a 5 gallon nursery pot (usually black). You just have to be sure the rhizomes can’t crawl under the pot walls to escape their rightful place in your garden. I urge you to consider growing them in extra large flower pots with a drain hole that is covered with a piece of window screen to let the excess water out and keep the roots in. Alternatively, you may want to simply dedicate a single garden bed to mints and let them interbreed to their heart’s content.

I miss the wonderful mint smell on my hands after hours of pulling these plants up but I don’t miss the time it took to keep them in check. If you fall for this lovely smelling family, just beware of its bad habits!

For More Information

Are you brave enough to add some mint plants to your gardens in spite of my experiences? If so, may I recommend Mints: A Family of Herbs and Ornamentals by Barbara Perry Lawton. This book was published by Timber Press in 2002.

Mints have been used throughout history as spices, medicines and even as housecleaning products. Many of our herbs, including thyme, sage, rosemary and basil, are in the mint family. True mints form just one portion of this large family of plants.

Lawton spends three chapters discussing the mint plant family. She divides the plants in to herbs, ornamentals, and weeds. This information is followed by a discussion of pests, diseases and a brief discussion of mint botany. The final chapter presents a “Catalog of Mints”, including both those used as herbs and those considered ornamental plants. I was surprised at how may of my favorite garden flowers are in the mint family.

Anyone interested in learning more about the mint family will find this book to be easy reading. The chapter topics are arranged in a logical manner. The author’s writing style makes it a book good for both the general gardener and the plant specialist who insists on having Latin names for all their plants. May I suggest this adding this book to your wish list?

Note: The term “mint” as used in this book may refer to either the herbs we call “mints” or to those plants from the plant family that is called mint. This can be a bit confusing to new gardeners. You may find comparing plant families to your family an easy way of understanding this situation. In most families, everyone shares the same last name. This family consists of the parents and children. You are also in a larger family consisting of uncles, aunts, grandparents and cousins who may have different last names. If you refer to the “White family”, you may be talking about either your immediate family or about all your cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents. This larger family may have individual families with varying last names.

In the plant world, plants belong to a “family” and a “genus”. Consider the plant family to be your group of relatives including your immediately family. The plant genus is just your immediate family.