Lemon Thyme
Thymus pulegioides
Found in pastures, orchards, disturbed areas. FloraQuest, phone app (app page) What its natural habitat tells you
Not native to Virginia. How scores work Is it native here?
Profile 76%
- Height
- 8–12 inches
- Spread
- 8–12 inches
- Light
- Full sun
- Soil moisture
- Somewhat dry to moist
No photograph yet. Looking for an old drawing…
Plant this instead
Choose your county to list local plants first.
No recorded swaps for this county. Try the garden finder.
At a glance
- Life cycle
- Woody perennial
- Leaves
- Evergreen
- Bloom
- June to September
Recorded in 5 Virginia counties.
Natural habitats
Places it grows wild. Not a planting requirement. Each habitat page lists the plants and wildlife also found there.
Roadsides, fields and disturbed ground
Ground opened by people: roadsides, old fields, pastures, fencerows and lots.
Who uses this plant?
3CaterpillarsGenus host records with ranges including VA
Genus host records with ranges including VA · Thymus
- Ancylis floridanaStrawberry Leafroller
- Eupithecia miserulataCommon Eupithacia, Common Pug
- Lineodes integraEggplant Leafroller
—BeesSoutheastern regional records
—Specialist beesPollen specialists
—BirdsRecorded genus food-resource interactions; not a state feeding claimPlant details
- Family
- Lamiaceae
- Hardiness
- Zones 4a–8b
- Soil pH
- Neutral to alkaline
- Flower color
- Pink or purple
Safety has not been reviewed for this plant; check toxicity and thorns before planting.
Growing sources and scope
- Bloom · “June to September” · FloraQuest: Carolinas, Georgia (Southeastern Flora Team), phone app (app page) · Carolinas and Georgia
- Flower color · “Pink or purple” · NC Extension Plant Toolbox
- Hardiness · “Zones 4a–8b” · NC Extension Plant Toolbox
- Height · “8–12 inches” · NC Extension Plant Toolbox
- Leaves · “Evergreen” · NC Extension Plant Toolbox
- Life cycle · “Woody perennial” · NC Extension Plant Toolbox
- Light · “Full sun (6 or more hours of direct sunlight a day)” · NC Extension Plant Toolbox
- Soil · “Moist; Occasionally dry” · NC Extension Plant Toolbox
- Soil pH · “Neutral to alkaline” · NC Extension Plant Toolbox
- Spread · “8–12 inches” · NC Extension Plant Toolbox
Conservation status
| Virginia rank | SNA |
|---|---|
| Global rank | GNR |
| VA status | Not verified |
| Federal status | Not verified |
Sources
- Digital Atlas of the Virginia Flora
- USDA PLANTS
- FloraQuest: Carolinas, Georgia (Weakley), phone app (app page)
- FloraQuest: Northern Tier (Weakley), phone app (app page)
- NatureServe Explorer
- Shropshire & Tallamy 2025, Lepidoptera of North America north of Mexico, ZooKeys 1261 (ODbL)
- Noori, Seltmann & Orr 2026, A curated and integrated dataset for exploring global bee-plant interactions (GloBI), Zenodo, CC BY 4.0
- Smith, Bachelder, Russell, Morales, Mosher & Seltmann 2024, Bee-Specialization-Modeling v0.6.1 (specialist host table compiled from J. Fowler's pollen specialist bee lists), Zenodo, CC BY 4.0
- Hurlbert, Olsen, Sawyer & Winner 2021, Avian Diet Database, Scientific Data 8: 260 (CC0)
- Narango, Tallamy & Shropshire 2020, Few keystone plant genera support the majority of Lepidoptera species, Nature Communications