picture by Rick Gush
Whereas most herbs for the kitchen are preferred fresh here in Italy , oregano is one really popular spicery that is almost always used in the dry form .
There is a spot of variation among the various species oforegano , but the most common areOriganum vulgare , which has majestic - pink flowers ( I grow this one . ) andOriganu m heracleoticum , which has white flush and is commonly ring Greek Oregano . Both of those metal money are coarse wild plants around the Mediterranean basin . The island of Sicily is specially heavily covered byOriganum heracleoticum . Tracking down the twelve or so constitute smorgasbord that look in the United States baby’s room trade can be fun , but most of it has a passably similar feel , so gardeners can just be glad with whatever type they happen to find .
Oregano is a perennial , but in colder climate it is also grown as an yearly . It grows almost 3 feet magniloquent in the most extreme situations , but half that is a more common height . It does spread out laterally by sending out stolon . I ’ve found that keeping the dirt sharpness around the oregano plant well weed and slightly cultivated helps the plant clump to flop sideways and increase its diameter over the path of a season . One plant can grow from a 6 - inch mass to a clustering 2 substructure or more across in one season , and the bigger the clump , the more harvestable upright stems will be produce . Two plant life can easily fill a 6 - foot - foresightful bed over the course of two seasons .
marjoram flowering ordinarily start in July to September , depending on the locating , and the flowers stay put open for about a calendar month before they start withering . Oregano can grow at up to about 6,000 to 7,000 infantry height ; in the state of nature , winter sweet seems to prefer jolty , gay and dry locations . educate oregano is mostly grown on cryptic and prolific territory , but fresh methods are pushing crop onto more bare land .
There is a fairish amount of stuff flying around about how the feeling of cultivated marjoram can be ruined by pampering the plant life too much . It is true that Origanum vulgare grown in good , deep soil will produce much larger quantities of harvestable stems . Plus , if those plant are not fed an excessive amount of nitrogen late in their increment cycles , then everything will be all right and the result oregano will taste good . However , what happens sometimes is that gardener arise oregano in a pot as part of a group of terrace pants that he or she feeds every week with liquid fertilizer . In this case , yes , too much fertilizer can lessen the posture of the smack of the leaves .
sunlight and drain are good for oregano plant , but a fleck of shade can be tolerated , and the young and fledged flowering plants will both appreciate frequent tearing . My main pot marjoram growing tip is to keep the patch weed very well , in such a way that there are no other weeds growing amongst the clunk . In that way , at harvesting time , it ’s easy to harvest handful of oregano only , without any sess postulate to be removed .
I glean the plants while they are blossom , and this seems to be the most common practice here . Once I ’ve cut the handful of stems at about a foot or so in length , I wrap those in little bundles and store them for a calendar month in a lovesome dry dark seat to cure them . Then they can be kept in paper old bag for many month and used when needed .
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