[Artemisia] Growing artemisias

[Elaine]

Greetings all:
Here are a few more thoughts on growing artemisias. I've tried a few of
them.

Mugwort will reseed everywhere (at least it does here in the Salt Lake
Valley.) It's a tall and not particularly beautiful plant. On the other
hand, I found that simmering the leaves with orange peel and other nice
smelling things to scent and humidify a room can help if your head is
congested.

I grew one Sweet Ann plant (artemisia annua) a few years back as I read that
it was fragrant. It is; I made some really pretty wreaths out of it. The
mistake I made was allowing the flowers to open before I did so. My hay
fever is fairly mild, but I went through a LOT of Benadryl while working on
the wreaths and using them to decorate. I ended up burning them. They were
definitely pretty and fragrant, though.

I was seeking plants that were referred to in literature or folklore, with
mixed results. I had several artemisias, rue, yarrow, and a lot of culinary
herbs as well. I stopped growing most of them because I had no time to tend
the garden, and really no use for most of them. But it was fun for a while.

Regards,
Caryn