[Hilary]

I have named this " sad plant" because it is in the garden of a family whose house has been repossessed,.
The plant seemed to be thriving on neglect.
Is it a Salvia?

[oron peri]

Yes, it is Salvia greggii

[Hilary]

Oron,
Many thanks for identifying this plant for me

[Fleur Pavlidis]

Not S. microphylla? Just from the colour.

[oron peri]

Fleur

It is not the colour that counts in this case, it is the leaf form.

Both S. microphylla and S. greggii have many color forms, mostly cultivars.

Often it is quite difficult to tell as both hybridize freely in cultivation. There is a natural hybrid as well, named Salvia x jamensis.

The best way to distinguish between the two are the leaves:
S. greggii has nerrower, slightly bluish leaves with smooth margins [you can notice it at the lower photo]
S. microphylla  has more roundish, deeper green, non smooth surface and serrated margins

But the hybrids may have all the carachters above...

[Fleur Pavlidis]

Thank you Oron for explaining the difference. I brought four or five different coloured S. greggii from England a few years ago and they all died pretty quickly so I assumed that only S. microphylla would survive in our climate. I've just examined a white salvia I bought here and is doing quite well. By using your guidelines it must be a S. microphylla. I rubbed the leaves to see if they were smooth and am now enjoying the scent.

[oron peri]

I rubbed the leaves to see if they were smooth and am now enjoying the scent.

Yes, but you have missed the best part of S. microphylla, when we were kids we used to pick as many flowers possible, join them toogether than suck the neckter from the base, it has a fantastic, sweet taste!

[Umbrian]

Yes, MANY thanks Oron for all that useful info re Salvias. I have been adding to my collection whenever possible and since many of the ones I obtain have no label have never known exactly what they are. Now I can go round and examine them all and try to decide.
I took cuttings of many of them to put in my new (scented) garden and they have all thrived this year and made large plants that have been in flower since late spring.
One I particularly prize is a greggii, funnily enough identified last weekend for me when I took a young plant for a friend attending an IB meeting. I seem to remember it had the name Mellin ? when I bought it. It has beautiful apricot coloured flowers - do you know this one?

[oron peri]

Carole,

I have been looking for a cultivar with the name 'Mellin' but have not found any.
There are quite a few apricot coloured cultivars, one which is really nice is 'Apricote Pumkin'

[Jill S]

Carole, 'salvia jamensis melen' in a plant list from an Italian nursery called something like 'Greggioviva'. It's scented so they say but a very pale combination of yellow/orange/brown. Could this be your 'Mellin'?

[Umbrian]

Might be Jill - must do some more research although I have to admit I cannot be certain where exactly I obtained it!  Will try and get a 'photo in the next day or so but if Oron is at a loss ........

[David Dickinson]

Is this the nursery you were referring to Jill? http://www.greggiovivai.it/prodotti.asp

I am the happy recipient of one of Umbrian's cuttings and it certainly looks like the plant in the picture on that web page.

We already have a lot of excellent books, many of them by members of this society, which tell us how to cultivate our cherished plants. Now, when are all you knowledgeable people going to get together and produce a book which will tell us what to look for to enable us to identify plants in cultivation? A labour of love, probably, but you never know - there might be a fortune to be made too. Volumes 1-? for species. The other umpteen volumes for cultivars. Who knows, it might be finished in time for the next century

[Jill S]

That's the one David, found it when I just had a quick look while being nagged about getting off to bed, made for a certain amount of non-recollection ))

As for how to find things, well, knowledgeable people have their methods which could/can be documented, the rest of us mortals just have to do our normal scatter-brain flailing around and hope to get lucky.

The salvia looks lovely, if you have a cutting from it then your luck's already in!