How to Grow Chamomile
Although chamomile is a favorite herb for making tea, it's also a charming annual (grows just one year) flower that's perfect for cottage and other casual gardens. Does this Spark an idea?
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Things You'll Need
- Garden Spades
- Seeds
- Mulch
- Plants
- Fertilizers
- Compost Makers
- Garden Trowels
Instructions
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1
Buy healthy, green plants with no signs of wilting or disease. Plants should be stocky with plenty of leaves. It's actually a plus if they don't have any flowers - they'll divert their early energy into root development rather than flowering.
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Choose a site in full sun with average to rich, well-drained soil.
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Work in plenty of compost.
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Plant seedlings in spring or mid fall, spacing them 6 inches apart for a carpetlike ground cover effect, or 18 inches apart in herb and flower gardens.
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Keep soil evenly moist. Mulching is a good idea.
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Trim faded flowers or shear the plant occasionally to promote new blooms.
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Fertilize every four to six weeks, or work in a slow-release fertilizer at planting time.
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Tear out faded annual types of chamomile at the end of the season, once frost fells them. Cut back perennial types to just 2 or 3 inches.
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Tips & Warnings
Chamomile comes in both annual (grows just once a year) and perennial (returns year after year) types. German chamomile (Matricaria recutita) is the annual type; Roman chamomile (Anthemis nobilis) is the perennial type.
Growing just 3 to 9 inches high, chamomile spreads about 24 inches, making it useful as a ground cover as well. It covers itself from early to mid summer in pretty yellow and white flowers, which can be made into chamomile tea - reputed to soothe upset stomachs and digestive systems as well as calm the nerves.
Chamomile also likes its soil moist but not wet and does well between pavers and stepping-stones.
Chamomile performs well where temperatures in summer do not regularly reach 100 degrees F.
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Comments
View all 8 Comments-
Aw well that's no good. I finally got my chamomile to grow from seed this year! Where I live, it's hard to grow it for some reason. Best of luck to your flowers!
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Except of course my camomile has not yet flowered despite having been growing for a year?
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wyldcrafter
Oct 12, 2006
To get the most out of your chamomile, cut the flower tops off towards the end of spring while they are in their prime and before they die. This will give you the best tasting chamomile with potentcy and it will keep the plants alive longer. A plant's main goal in its brief life is to reproduce. By cutting off the flowers, you encourage the rest of the plant to grow bigger and healthier. By leaving dead flowers on a plant, the plant may die from stress. Trim the flowers off in the spring, cut the plant back in the fall.
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wyldcrafter
Oct 12, 2006
To get the most out of your chamomile, cut the flower tops off towards the end of spring while they are in their prime and before they die. This will give you the best tasting chamomile with potentcy and it will keep the plants alive longer. A plant's main goal in its brief life is to reproduce. By cutting off the flowers, you encourage the rest of the plant to grow bigger and healthier. By leaving dead flowers on a plant, the plant may die from stress. Trim the flowers off in the spring, cut the plant back in the fall.
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Nov 22, 2005
If you do not take care of the Chamomile plant properly, it can get out of hand. It will start to look like a shrubby, dead plant. Pruning once or twice a month might be necessary, depending on how fast your plant grows. This is one of the most successful plants I have ever seen. I would recommend this to any garderner, experienced or not. Chamomile is such a great plant, and it is wonderful-looking wherever you put it.
