Salvias

I never used to be a huge fan of Salvias, but I don’t think I fully appreciated the HUGE range there is. There are over 1000 salvias - so there really must be one for everyone. They are quite diverse - from the small foliaged, dainty flowered varieties to those with bigger leaves and larger showy bracts.

Salvias are part of the Lamiaceae family which is the same family as mint, rosemary, basil and oregano. The herb sage that you cook with is a kind of salvia - Salvia officinalis. (Officinalis means that it was traditionally a medicinal herb).

Salvias are quite drought hardy and adaptable, though they do usually prefer good drainage, so if you have really clay-y soil you might need to improve it a bit first. Or try bog sage (Salvia uliginosa) - which loves damp areas.

The things I love most about salvias are that a) they flower pretty much all year round and b) they are so easy to propagate. Simply snip a bit off, stick it in some damp sandy potting mix and voila! Most of the time you’ll have a new plant. If you do a few, you’re nearly guaranteed to have one of them work. And who would say no to a free plant?

A little cheat I learnt from a local is having a big pot sitting near my cutting bench that I often just shove cuttings into whenever I’m pruning. My soil’s quite sandy so I just use that but you could achieve the same by mixing coarse sand and potting mix. This kind of goes against the ‘good hygiene, always use clean sterile mix’ theory for propagating but hey - these guys are so hardy, it works and I haven’t had any problems. It also means I always have a few plants at the ready if I have a space to fill in the garden. Obviously not all plants will strike readily this way, but anything from the Lamiaceae family is worth a shot! My pot is full of cuttings from Salvias, Perennial Basil, Coleus and Plectranthus.

Once upon a Lime

Bidens