Hoda M. Fadel

Effect of organic agriculture practices on the volatile flavor components of some essential oil plants growing in Egypt: III. Thymus vulgaris L. essential oil.

Abstract Thyme herb (Thymus vulgaris L) received different treatments of organic and chemical fertilization to study the effect of these treatments on the biomass, essential oil content, and its chemical composition. Chemical fertilizers as ammonium nitrate, was used at 100 and 200Kg/ acre, while the organic fertilizer as mature compost was used at 10 and 20 m3/acre, respectively. The herb was harvested two times in June and September during its growth cycle. The obtained results indicated that the oil content of thyme at the first cut was slightly higher for chemically fertilized herb compared with the organic one. However, in the second cut there was no difference in the oil content. Organic fertilization at high level (20 m3/acre) increased the percentage of oxygenated components in thyme oil especially thymole (51.1 %) compared with any other treatments in which thymole content ranged between 31.4 - 43.2 %. High levels of organic fertilization also shifted the major components of thyme oil; thymole, carvacrole, and y-terpinene to the high margins specified by the European pharmacopoeia.