Breathe Wild Mint Seeds

currently unavailable Strong Flavor-Vigorous Growth-Able to Tolerate Dry Conditions

My reselected 'Breathe' brings back the strong mint flavor of Mitchum without having the finicky soil conditions needed for mint cultivation.  "Breathe" was done by raising seedlings of previous selections and seeds from European mints while winnowing out only the strongest in flavor as well as large leaves, thick rhizomes like applemint, and vigorous growth habit. Keep in mind this is not for your average flower garden, but is a highly competitive plant able to take a mowing and trimming to yield the highest amount of leaves per season. With the help of my daughter, we spent a mouth numbing day testing a couple hundred mint plants grown from seed finally whittling it down to the top ten plants or so. This is a composite cultivar using clonal propagation but contains several individuals.  You may never have to plant mint again with these selections. We have found that adding mint to areas where we mow is always an aromatic experience. 

From seeds, this selection also allows you to clonally select individuals that do best in your location. Mint is an unusual plant in that it adapts to where it grows best due to its genetic background. That is partially why there are a lot of wetland type mints. Once I found an individual colony along a river in central Michigan that had zero aromatic compounds. In other words, mint with no mintiness.  I took it to my farm and grew it. The same thing happened. It grew for two years before fading entirely. Growing mint from wild selections is not easy as most failed after 3-4 years without irrigation. All it takes is one dry year and the planting is toast. However with 'Breathe' selections with better drought tolerance is possible and like applemint, very drought tolerant with larger and thicker rhizomes. This is good for a field plant but not really a dainty garden flower plant as it will soon overwhelm other plants as it is not in the tidy class. Its in the robust class and I don't care about your pretty little flowers class.