As we move toward warmer (and longer!) days, we’re longing for lavender. We might be a little while away from harvest time in the summer, but thought we’d share some fun facts about this wonderful plant we picked up in a conversation with our resident “dirt whisperer”—the one and only Mark Marino.
‘Grosso’ lavender, the type we grow at The Ranch, is a hybrid of English and Portuguese lavenders.
Sounds pretty exotic, doesn’t it? We grow it for a number of reasons, but first and foremost because it thrives in our weather and doesn’t need a lot of moisture. (Drought-tolerant plants are always important in California, even given the massive deluge we got after the start of 2023.) Grosso is prolific when it comes to flowering, too—which is important, because we use it to distill essential oils. In fact, it’s the primary commercial variety of lavender grown for producing oil.
We use our lavender throughout the resort.
Not only do we produce dried bundles for our guests (Grosso is good for drying because it doesn’t shatter), we use the essential oil we distill in a lot of different ways. You’ll find our lavender in the soaps in The Ranch’s guestrooms, at Spa Aiyana (it’s used in treatments), even in dishes and drinks at Valley Kitchen and other spots. Grosso has an intense fragrance, so a little goes a long way!
You can get about 12 pounds of essential oil per acre of lavender.
That might not sound like a lot, but many of those little essential-oil bottles you see hold about a third of an ounce. That means one acre (a little less than the size of a football field) can produce almost 600 of those little bottles!
Lavender can do more than add fragrance and flavor.
Many people find lavender oil relaxing and soothing—they use it to ease sore muscles, relieve headaches, even promote good sleep. Lavender oil also can be used for insect bites, bee stings, and sunburns.
There are a lot of species of lavender—and it’s in the mint family!
There’s a reason you might get a hint of mint when you enjoy a dish or a drink with lavender in it, and that’s because Lavandula is actually part of the mint family. The plant has almost 50 different species, with some better suited for specific uses than others.
Whether you’re enjoying it at the spa, at the table, or in your room at The Ranch—or just taking in the view of our flowing fields—we think you’ll agree that life is just better with lavender in it. Even the bees agree, because our lavender plants are their primary source of nectar here in the summer!