Scottish Rock Garden Club Forum
Plant Identification => Plant Identification Questions and Answers => Topic started by: ChrisB on August 26, 2011, 11:02:28 AM
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Hi, I got this from Veteran Vet last year, he wasn't sure of its name. He thought it was a scrophularia but the flower does look a bit salvia-like to me. Any ideas gratefully accepted.
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It looks like a salvia to me too Chris, but what do I know? Have you tried emailing a picture to the National Collection holder?
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Never thought of that Brian, and I should have as a former NC holder myself ;D I'll give it a try.
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Just checked and they don't have email or web site :'(
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Try this guy: http://www.robinssalvias.com/
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Robin got back to me. He says it may be a rare salvia, but he is not sure about how square the stem is, so I have to go get some more to look at the stem. Otherwise, he's guessing at possibly a scutellaria.
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Interesting nonetheless Chris I am sure you will keep us posted.
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Salvia specialist and collection holder both now think it is a stachys, but which one I wonder?
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Salvia specialist and collection holder both now think it is a stachys, but which one I wonder?
Don't look at me..... I can't tell the difference..... :-\ :-[ :-[ :-[
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S. chrysantha maybe? That is quite a low plant.
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Lesley, I think you've got it. Just googled it for images and my plant looks pretty similar. Thank you so much!! I just knew someone here would be able to name it!
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It's probably 20 years since I had it in the garden so the memory's a bit hazy. Two other super species with woolly foliage are S. saxicola with white flowers and S. candida which can be either pink or white. They're all nice plants to drape down a wall if you have one.
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Thank you for that learning experience Chris, it's a new one on me and rather attractive...
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Sadly, Lesley, I have no walls. Its my deepest wish to have a walled garden..... but I fear it is not to be. Have to share a friend's wall instead, so I keep giving her things and have visiting rights. I'm going to have a go at propagating it now I know what it is. If I can get it going and you want to try it, Brian, let me know.
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Seed might be your best bet Chris. I've always found the woolly Stachys species quite difficult from cuttings. If you take the cutting just below leaf nodes, the stem narrows to the node and somehow seems to lose substance. Not explaining that very well. Have a go anyway. Good luck. :)
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I will Lesley, and I'll also leave on the flowers so it may self seed. The ordinary S. byzantina seeds very successfully here so it may be my best bet, but I'll have a go with a cutting anyway. Worth a try. Must say I've never tried them from cuttings either. Will scrape off the wool to avoid rot and see....
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Olivier Filippi, nurseryman in South of France, tells me it can't be chrysantha which had round leaves when he saw it in Greece... :-\
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Oh dear. My plant has lanceolate shaped leaves, not very long either, but very hairy. I've just googled again and am now stuck again. I looked at all the ones you suggested Lesley, none other than chrysantha look like it somehow. Wonder if its some sort of hybrid. never knew there were so many stachys!!!
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So back to square one? When I had S. chrysantha I remember that the mat had roundish leaves but I'm pretty sure the stem leaves were closer to long and narrow but the whole plant was only about 15cms in flower.
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How frustrating Chris, what on earth can it be?
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Someone will know I'm sure. I'm going to take some pictures of its habit. Trouble is, its half covered by a vigorous diascia at the moment, I'll have to find an angle to take it at. Its flowering well at the moment too. Nice to have plants in flower this time of year. That was one of the reasons for considering whether it might be a salvia, but the lack of a distinctly square stem seems to rule that idea out from what the experts tell me.
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There are several very attractive woolly salvias. S. daghestanica is one but mine hasn't flowered yet so I don't know what the flowers are like. S. pomifera is another and doubtless there are others. But it still looks rather like a stachys. :-\
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Googling tells me that both are purple, the later with red calyces. Very nice indeed.
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They sound lovely Lesley. I have just six seeds for you from S. chaemydryoides. Must get them off in the post to you!
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Chris - could it be a species of Sideritis? I have grown syraica, which is aromatic and with smaller yellow flowers but very wholly lanceolate a little like your plant. A couple of species, glacialis and scardica, are described in Jelitto and Schacht.
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That's definitely a possibility Tim and Chris. I had S. syriaca myself once but lost it eventually. We're not allowed to import the seed here because they can be made into a hallucinagenic tea. I believe the Greeks and Turks enjoy (;D) this, so you could maybe have yourself some fun Chris.
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None of those look quite like it Lesley. Tomorrow I'll take a photo, its too dark now to do it today. The habit and flower racemes are not the same at all, but I can see why you thought it might be from my earlier picture. I love trying to find the name of a plant, its such fun when you don't know and are looking. I've checked quite a few of my books without success so far. It is definitely hardy here, it came through last winter covered in feet of snow. Anyway, wait until I take a pic of the habit, it may help some. Thanks for your efforts!
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And thinking even more, perhaps I'll take a piece tomorrow when I go to Ron's do I think Tim is going, but maybe Ron or someone else will recognise it!
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And thinking even more, perhaps I'll take a piece tomorrow when I go to Ron's do I think Tim is going, but maybe Ron or someone else will recognise it!
That's a good idea, Christine, I've never known Ron fail to make a correct ID. 8)
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And of course you'll let us know. I'm getting a bit frustrated now myself, and want it identified. ::) If no-one on the Forum knows, it probably doesn't exist! ;D
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Hi Lesley,
Julia Cordon thought it might be a teucrium, then Ron later, without knowing what Julia had said, thought also it might be that species. Here are two more pics of the plant in situ. Ignore the pink, they are spent diascia flowers. The plant does not have many flowers, at least not this year. And most teucriums seem to have foliage with some sort of toothed edges, whereas this plant does not. That, of course, does not rule out its being a teucrium, but I'm still not convinced. Anyway, here is the plant habit:
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Flowers, when they come, should help. In the meantime, pinch the foliage and report on the scent. I'd bet there will be one.
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Flowers are on first post, page one of the thread....
http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=7806.msg212634#msg212634
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Yes, Lesley, there is some aroma, but its very mild and I cannot describe it at all. Nothing like salvia, that's for sure, and really not much like the other teuchrium I have in my garden either. I'll take note of the scent of my other stachys tomorrow and see if it smells like those at all.
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Flowers are on first post, page one of the thread....
http://www.srgc.org.uk/smf/index.php?topic=7806.msg212634#msg212634
Yes, but not conclusive. Flowers on the whole plant, in the garden instead of picked, may be better.
Unfortunately salvias and teucriums both have a wide variety of scents. S. microphylla is like meat paste for instance while S. confertiflora has to my mind, a horrid oily smell and there are many others. The foliage of Teucrium ackermannii is deliciously perfumed while the flowers smell like sewage. So if you can work out what the smell is like it could be helpful.
I can't believe that this plant will be the one that finally beats the combined knowledge and experience of the Forumists. :)
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Our AGS meeting is tonight, so I'm going to take along another sprig to see if anyone there can help us.
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John Richards says it is a stachys from Spain, and he's seen it growing there. He thinks he has a book that will verify its full name.
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Well that's excellent news Chris. Nothing like going to the top for best information. :)
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Hoorah, excellent detective work!
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Thank goodness for "Jock"..... if Christine had had to take many more bits off the plant in the hope of an ID there would have been nothing left of it! ;)
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Maggi, the worst part is, that a 12ft high tree stump up which I have growing two wisterias for 15 + years snapped in the gales and fell on top of this plant. I think it has survived, but only just and goodness knows what I've lost under the pile. Wind is finally dying down a bit now, so we'll get out to assess the damage and figure out what we can do. I think we'll have no wisteria for a while for sure. Whether we have to cut it to the ground I'm not sure yet. The tree stump was about 15 inches in diameter, so its very heavy....
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And here is my disaster. Such a shame. We are still assessing what we can do about it....
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Christine, I can imagine how sad you are about this disaster. The Wisteria's don't look broken. Maybe you can rescue them. I hope so!
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Sorry to see that Chris, the trouble with wind when the climbers/trees are in full leaf is that it can be as devastating in the garden as this. Such a shame :-\
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I too think that the wisteria looks in pretty good order.... a careful extraction of the tree from the middle of the tangle and a re-erection of the wisteria on a new support..... metal wigwam.... large and sturdy? Big job, no doubt, but just about possible, tackled steadily. I suspect that any fatalities under the fallen mass are goners so it perhaps matter less if you take rather a while to extract the tree from the wisteria at your own pace.... :-\ Hope I'm right!
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I know this is nature's own pruning method but its left me with an interesting problem. The wisteria does not appear, on first inspection, to have snapped, so yes, if I can get the tree bit out (lol), I could buy one of those obelisk things for it to grow up. But its going to be very difficult to do that. First though, I'm thinking to cut off all the top so I just have the two wisteria stems, and it does already sprout from them so there is a good chance it would recover, but that's a job for next year I suspect. Its such a shame. I thought the wisteria was getting sufficiently stout to grow without the tree supporting it actually, but now I'm not so sure. But its been just as windy today again, much too windy to go out and do anything, that's for sure. The forecast looks as if the wind will drop some by tomorrow. All the trees are totally dessicated here too. If it doesn't rain soon, I fear a lot of other plants will become vulnerable too.
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Hi Chris
Perhaps you could leave it where it fell and train it horizontally backwards and forwards. Gradually training upwards as the stems become rigid. You may then end up with a wall of flower on both sides. It seems a shame to lose the flowering potential it already has. You could then train a scrambler or other climber that flowers at a different time through it.
Just a thought :-\
P.S. you could join the two beds together and create an herbaceous island with the wisteria as the centre point. Less grass to cut ;)
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I do hope you can retrive something of the Wisterias Chris. They take so long to grow up and settle into flowering well. Some good suggestions there. Best wishes for a rescue effort. I hate wind it is so destructive.
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That wasn't an option I had considered, Graham, but I'll think on it. The biggest problem is getting the tree trunk disentangled from the wisteria. I'm going to have to cut off the umbrella part of the plants for sure, but it will recover from that pruning in a couple of years or so I think. If only I can get that tree trunk out then I will have options. I'm still waiting for the wind to die down, its still blowing a gale out there.
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I would HOPE (!!) that the tree trunk is rotten enough to allow for gentle removal out the bottom end of the wisteria..... bit by bit..... ??? ??? :-\ :-\
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Good news. We've been out this morning to assess the wisteria situation. Took off all the
umbrella canopy, then the tree stump within was examined. We sawed away at the
top end of the stump, which had bits of old tree limbs protruding etc, got rid of that,
then we spotted that there was a crack down the whole trunk. Harry put his wedges
in it and started trying to lever it apart, but it wasn't working, but what we did notice
was that the whole stump was moving, so he hit the top end that we'd sawed with
the big mallet and I pulled at the bottom end, and it slid out. Hey presto, we have
our wisteria back! Now all we have to do is sort out how to support it. For now
three pieces of wood in a wigwam arrangement through the branches, but longer
term we need something more robust. But at least I still have the wisteria and have
high hopes it will return to its former glory one day.
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Hooray for Harry!
This is very encouraging news..... well done to you both...... now we just have to wait for the fab wisteria pix in coming years, eh?!! ;)
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Excellent news Chris, like hearing that a riend who was in a bad accident will be all right after all. Well done. 8) (Which still doesn't name our little mystery plant though. :-\ :D)
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You are quite right Lesley. But it did survive the wisteria falling on it, so its ok. I've cut back all around it too, so hoping it will do a little more flowering before the autumn closes in on us. And I think I'll take it along to the discussion weekend too, in case someone there knows its full name. I think John will look it up in a book he has eventually, but I don't like to bother him, he's a busy man.