Catnip Catastrophe

What could have been

Okay, maybe it isn't a full blown catastrophe, since there was only 2 plants to begin with, but I'm still pretty bummed.  I'm not sure if I mentioned it before, but about a week or so ago, I found a couple little catnip plants growing amongst my Three Sisters beds.  The first plant, I didn't notice what it was until I'd yanked it out of the ground, but once it was on the backpull, headed up toward my nose, I apologized profusely to the little thing, and lovingly replanted it somewhere that I'd like it to grow up and be a big plant.  A few days later, it unsurprisingly died.

The second plant, I noticed what it was before unceremoniously yanking it from the ground, so I carefully transplanted it to its new home.  I was waiting to see how it would fare before writing this post though.  Then today, I was weeding in the garden and noticed the little kittennip (that's what baby catnip plants are properly called, right?) plant was gone!  Completely gone!  Not a trace left of it.  I think something must have ate it in the night or something. 

Definitely am seriously bummed!

I don't have any cats, in case you are wondering.  In fact, I'm horribly allergic to cats and prefer to stay far, far away from the adorable little fuzzballs, since I value my ability to breathe.

Why am I so upset about losing a couple catnip plants then?  Catnip isn't just for kittehs you know!

Catnip has many uses beyond getting Kitty high.  It can be used as a herb in cooking and goes really well with lemon and chicken.  It can also be used as a tea to help aid sleep, to calm someone, or to help bring down a fever.  You can also rub the plant on yourself as a mosquito repellent, or, if you are crafty enough, make essential oil from it to make a super potent homemade mosquito spray, more powerful than commercial products containing DEET...and it's a lot safer than DEET containing sprays as well! 

And all that is just off the top of my head! 

I'm sure it has many other uses too that I haven't thought of at the moment, but since I'm in catnip mourning until I can find more catnip plants, I don't feel like looking up more or citing my sources for the uses I've listed, or even digging up my recipe for lemon catnip chicken (goes great on rice!).  I suppose I could buy some catnip seeds or probably even plants, but considering it is a fairly prolific weed, that doesn't seem very thrifty to me!  Instead, I'll keep my eyes open and find some more freebie plants, somewhere.  Maybe even growing in my garden again.