A Plant A Day Till Spring – Day 43 – Garden Sage

“Salvia State of Mind” – Late Spring 2011 – Whitney Avenue – Wilkinsburg, PA

“A Plant a Day till Spring” will highlight one plant a day, starting on the winter solstice (December 21, 2013)… And ending on the vernal equinox (March 20, 2014)… If all goes to plan I will be starting with old Snowdrop photos from 2013… And ending with new photos of Snowdrops in 2014…

Salvia officinalis… Better known as Garden Sage… I’d be willing to bet that if you grow herbs… You grow sage… I do… In fact… I grow a variety of Sage… And although I use it to cook with… I mostly grow it as an ornamental… I believe the value of this plant encompasses more than just the physical taste of the leaves… Salvia raises spirits… It lifts moods… And it attracts children… It is a wonder plant that is often hidden in the back of our gardens… But not my garden… I want the Salvias right up front… I want them where everyone can see them…

Garden sage is a herbaceous perennial native to the Mediterranean region… Because of this it rarely needs watered… Honestly… Once established it can survive without human intervention indefinitely… And that is fine and dandy if you are growing it with your tomatoes… But I am not…

Salvia requires annual pruning to keep it looking presentable… Sage blooms in the spring… This bloom period lasts roughly a month… When the last of the blossoms have withered… Prune the plant hard… I will prune every branch down to a 2 or 3″ stub… (sometimes you will notice tiny leaves at the bottom of each branch… If I find them I will prune right above that leaf) The plant will look like shit when you do this… But I promise it will come back to life in just a few short days… The plant will stay tight and compact for the rest of the year… This is helpful because the plant will stay small enough to not flop over after a rain…

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The neighborhood children (seedling) like to play with my Sage plant… Not as much as the Chocolate Mint patch… But they still like it… The leaves have a soft texture they find interesting… And the smell tickles their noses… I had trouble keeping leaves on them this year because I taught the neighbors “seedling” how to crush the leaves to release the scent… Apparently… A Sage leaf only smells good for the first sniff… Then you have to get a new one… I may try to break that habit this year… On second thought… The neighborhood seedlings could destroy my garden… As long as they learned something in the process… I would chalk it up as a win… A painful win… But a win none-the-less…

plant petunias and question everything – chriscondello

If you want some science – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvia_officinalis

New To writing and never had to cite sources before… These “Plant a Day Till Spring” posts are simply intended to kill time until spring when I start writing more… My source (where applicable) is Wikipedia.org… The photography is all my own… And I am adding my own information…

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