Spooker loves
cat mint like many cats love
cat nip.
What's the difference?
Cat nip is an annual, tall and lanky, with tiny white blossoms. It can freely reseed itself, and the same patch may act like a perennial.
The essential oil that many cats love is spread throughout the plant. The oils dry well in cat nip, and most of the 'nip cats use is in dried cat nip form. Here's a link to a picture of blooming
cat nip:
http://www.goldmountainherbfarm.com/PP/PPimages/catnip.jpg
Cat mint is a tough perennial, more bushy and with true-blue blossoms, often used in the landscape trade as a border plant. Here's a link to a picture of blooming cat mint:
http://www.youcanlearnseries.com/Landscape/Images/Catmint.jpg
The essential oil in cat mint is not as strong as in cat nip, and greatest potency can be found in the emerging leaves at the tip of the stalk, especially right before the plant blossoms. The oils in cat mint don't dry well, and fresh cat mint doesn't have a great effect on some cats, while on others, like Spooker, they prefer the 'mint over the 'nit when it comes to cat herbs. She not only loves to roll around on the leaves, she will eat them.Today in the mail, Spooker got a special gift: our friend Laure from The Misadventures of Me sent her a food storage system sealed packet of cat mint:
Coming tomorrow: pictures of Spooker enjoying her cat mint!Cheers,NTM
Very interesting.
ReplyDeleteWhat a neat gift, wow.
Can't wait to see Spooker with the cat mint.
We will has the mom cut sum more and send it out - we jus dun like cat mint. The mom enjoys the flowers and the smell of the leaves though. MOL
ReplyDeleteMolly
Shadow
Trooder
Mom Laure
Mom planted us cat nip an cat mint, an we didn't care too much fur da mint. Da nip tooked ofur. I don't mind cuz I luv luv luv luv luv NIP.
ReplyDeletePurrs,
Victor
Psst, NTM? Da firstest "perennial" should be "annual". Nip's an annual or biennial.
What a thoughtful gift from your friends; we can't wait to see the photos of Spooker enjoying it!...xo...Calle, Halle, Sukki
ReplyDeleteVery interesting! Mommy is waiting now to see what flowers we get on our plants to see which one we have. We go nuts over the fresh leaves and get all silly!
ReplyDeleteWe have the "MINT" and react to it strongly. So do neighboring cats, so TBT hadda bring ours back inside ta protect it from them.
ReplyDeleteBut he is gonna buy us a true NIP plant and see how we like THAT!
Wow, we've never head of cat mint before. Now we are so curious about it! We've got to seek it out!
ReplyDeleteRumbles HATES cat mint!! He's so funny. I quite like it.
ReplyDelete~Inigo~