How to Harvest Thyme and Prune It

Once you’ve bought some of our varied and tasty Thyme, you’ll want to know how to harvest it! That’s why we’ve put together this step by step guide on how to properly prune and harvest your Thyme plants. Keep reading to learn exactly what you need to do to keep both you and your herbs happy.

How to Harvest Thyme

1. The first step is confidence! Those new to harvesting might worry about hurting the plant, but this guide will tell you how it’s done, so you don’t need to be nervous. Herbs actually enjoy a trim, and taking a few cuttings will encourage them to grow more.
   
   
2. Next, find a pair of sharp scissors, as using them will give you a clean cut and won’t do any harm to the plant. Thyme is a woody herb, so it’s best to avoid using your hands when picking, since it’ll be more difficult, and tugging at the herb could end up damaging it.
   
   
3. Ideally, you’ll want to cut the top leaves off of the whole plant before it starts to flower, as preventing flowering will promote new growth, meaning more leaves for you to enjoy harvesting.
   
   
4. Now you need to know where to cut. Thyme can be trimmed down to one inch above the soil, and you can cut across the whole herb. Someone new to harvesting may feel more comfortable only cutting a few of the outer stems, or you can trim the slightly longer stems down to the height of the rest, if that’s what you prefer.
   
   
5. Last but not least, enjoy! And, we have recipes that you can check out to get the most out of your Thyme and other herbs.

Other Thyme Varieties

For some bonus advice we’ve included things to know about pruning/harvesting the other varieties of Thyme too!

1. Silver Thyme: this variety has a silvery tint to its leaves, as the name suggests. Harvesting it is the same as the common variety, but it’s worth knowing that Silver Thyme has a slightly less uniform growing shape to it, meaning the stems will vary in length and space out as they grow.
   
   
2. Golden Thyme: Golden Thyme grows lower to the ground than the others, so when harvesting it you can pinch off a few of the top leaves, and take from the outer edges to promote growth in the centre. For this variety, you’ll likely only need a couple of leaves for decorating your plate, rather than gathering a large harvest.
   
   
3. Lemon Thyme: with its distinctly lemony flavour, this is a great herb to use in cooking, and the method for harvesting it is the same as common Thyme. The way to tell these two varieties apart is that Lemon Thyme tends to have slightly larger leaves that are a bit more spaced out, plus you can rub the leaves to get that citrusy scent. 
   
   
4. Variegated Lemon Thyme: Variegated Thyme has the same citrus taste as Lemon does, but with the bonus of having uniquely coloured leaves. It tends to hang down as it grows, but all you need to do is start at the top of the stem and go down till it’s no less than one inch from the ground.
5. Creeping Red Thyme: this variety has beautiful, reddish purple flowers, so it’s better used for decorating than for eating.

To learn about the other herbs and varieties you’ll need to prune, stick with us. We’ll tell you everything you need to know about harvesting all your SEASON herbs!