Month: July 2021

One of the big, caney, Winter-flowering salvias of the involucrata group, Salvia karwinskii is a stand-out in the garden with big candelabras of pink flower spikes. Left to its own devices it is an open fountain of canes a couple of metres high, with sparse foliage compared to the canopies of S. involucrata and S. wagneriana. Leaves are large; 140 mm blades on 50 mm petioles, spear head shaped and 65 mm wide toward the base. Both surfaces are covered in short hairs, making the upper surface a matt green, and…

Read More

Salvia uliginosa and bog sage are the two unattractive names of this pretty plant with lovely pale blue flowers. As both names indicate, it grows naturally in marshy ground, but in gardens it grows well in standard soil. In fact withholding of water can be a strategy to contain it. I waited a while to get uliginosa, as it is invasive and I wanted to have a spot where that wouldn’t matter. It spreads by underground stems that look and act a bit like couch grass. Unusually for salvias that grow…

Read More