First things first: Laurah Brown is not the Catnip Queen.

That title belongs to Queen Edith, the dearly departed matriarch of Brown’s little kingdom in Vassalboro, between Waterville and Augusta. For years, the double-pawed Siamese-Burmese cat presided over Brown’s original catnip patch, 1,700 plants across a busy road from her farmhouse. But Edith’s legacy lives on. Today, Dammit Earl and Earlene Pearl – the new king and queen – keep watch over nearly 2 acres of plants, though they’re not the most alert guardians.

“Earl tends to fall asleep under the plants,” Brown said, laughing. “You’ll see a tail sticking out.”

Over the last 10 years, Brown has mastered the art of growing catnip in Maine. The Catnip Queen, a branch of her Kennebec River Co., started on a small parcel of a 250-acre dairy farm left to her by her great-grandfather. It has grown to include more than 8,000 plants, which Brown, 43, harvests twice a year. She dries the leaves in an old corn-drying barn, grinds them in an old yard mulcher that her father modified, and stuffs it into cat beds, toys, or plastic bags for cats who can handle the straight stuff.

“I think it’s a neat idea to take a farm that’s obsolete for dairy and obsolete for crops and turn it into something different,” Brown said as she sat in her office in the farmhouse. “I love this old farm and this is a way to keep it going.”

The Catnip Queen started out of Brown’s love for cats, however. Her father was a veterinarian, and as a little girl, she wanted to take in every stray. As an adult, she’s still hooked on a feline (or two). Earl and Earlene own the house – fortunately, they let Brown stay there. They eat at the table, which irks Brown’s teen-age children to no end.

“I say, we’re lucky the cats let us share their table. I share a king-size bed with them” – she held up her hands, 5 inches apart – “I have this much room and they have the rest.”

Nothing is too good for Brown’s cats, which is why she started growing catnip in the first place.

“I used to buy it at the grocery store to make my own toys, but I thought it was really awful catnip,” Brown said. “Then I decided I would just make better catnip and make better toys.”

Her toys are the real deal, and cats have been known to go to great lengths to get their paws on them. I bought a “Lost Mitten” for my parents’ cat and left it on the front seat of my car. The windows were open, and when I returned, a cat was running away from the car, toy in mouth, and the plastic package was torn to shreds on the seat.

I was surprised, but cat burglaries are nothing new to Brown.

“At the Common Ground Fair, I had a cat break into my booth,” she said. “There were teeth marks in everything. The dog sweaters had cat hair all over them.”

At a two-day craft fair in Wolfeboro, N.H., Brown returned the second day to find her booth torn apart, even though a security crew was guarding the vendor area. As it turns out, the culprit had four paws.

“They smell it,” she said. “They know.”

That’s how Earlene Pearl came into Brown’s life. She went out to the drying barn one morning and found muddy footprints all over the barn door – double-pawed footprints, just like Queen Edith’s.

“I thought, ‘This was just meant to be,'” Brown said, laughing.

Now, Earlene doesn’t have to claw her way into the barn. She is living a feline dream – an endless stash of catnip.

“I know a lot of people think it’s like a drug, but I don’t think of it that way,” Brown said. “It’s very calming for people whereas for cats, I like to say it promotes playful behavior.”

For humans, catnip is known for its soothing properties. Fresh leaves are used like cloves to numb a toothache. It’s a member of the mint family, and when its leaves are brewed in a tea, the herb is said to counteract insomnia and aid in relaxation.

Soon, Brown hopes to add Auntie E’s Catnip Tea for Women of all Menopausal Ages to her lineup. She now sells Cat-A-Tonic toys and cat beds with washable covers; Lost Mittens, which hang from a doorknob from a string; bags of Nice Kitty and Maine Coon Catnip, which has a history of the breed on the back; and Louise Jane’s Seafood Seasoning, to be sprinkled on the food of finicky cats.

With more than 600 active sales accounts and a contract with Hannaford Bros. to sell the Cat-A-Tonic beds and toys, Brown has come a long way since that first year. She used to go to all the craft shows, but now she sells through supermarkets and gift shops around the country.

Her success hasn’t come without some failures, however. There was the interactive marble game, which didn’t exactly fly. There were catnip bouquets that disintegrated in the process of shipping. And then there was the winter kill. Without knowing it, she planted her first crop of catnip in an unsheltered area across the road from her house. The rows were pointing in the wrong direction, and one winter, all the plants died. That spring, she was shocked to find nothing growing.

“I kept thinking I saw them coming up,” she said. “Fortunately, I had enough left over from the previous year.”

So she moved the operation across the road, where the house and the outbuildings would shelter the plants. She recently planted another plot, using only the healthiest “babies” from her plants, and hopes to have 2 acres full of nearly 10,000 plants by the end of next summer.

“These are better plants in better-prepared soil,” Brown said as she walked through the newer field. “I worked the soil till I vibrated when I laid down at night.”

She has taught herself nearly everything she knows about the crop. Her farm is certified organic and her office is packed with files full of plant research, growing conditions and climate charts. She knows which varieties will fare best in Vassalboro. She knows what her competition is doing (and yes, there is plenty of competition in the catnip market). She knows which packaging works and which fabrics are more popular with men and women.

“I’ve been obsessed with this as much as I am cats,” she said. “You have to build it.”

She contracts out much of the stitching for her toys and beds, but she and her assistant Ed Hoyt of Fairfield use one of the barns to cut the fabric and stuff the catnip in. She used to work in a room off the back of her house, but the business grew and she needed more space.

“I do a lot here,” she said, looking out the window onto a field and the turning leaves in the distance. “It depends on the time of year and the order size.”

Half of the barn is taken up by a cloth spreader, which keeps the rainbow-colored, cat-print fabric straight so Hoyt can cut it more easily. On the other side of the room, giant utility tubs full of catnip sit under Brown’s desk and a table full of finished toys and beds awaits packaging.

For now, she’s content with the catnip, but she knows the business will expand even further if she lets it. She hopes a larger company will buy her out someday. Then, she’d be able to live in the woods, where her property runs along the Kennebec River – set far back from the busy road that makes it so dangerous for Earl and Earlene.

“I don’t even know how many cats I’ll have then,” she said. “I’ll be in heaven.”

Catnip Queen products are available at www.catnipqueen.com or at Hannaford Bros. stores.