[John]

This is an amazing shrub which grows up to about a meter high. I know that at Alisdair and Heather's property in the Peloponnese they have it growing wild. It is a localised endemic to the SW Peloponnese. Though I have been to the Peloponnese many times I have never seen it there.
I acquired my plant from the local AGS meeting in Wimbledon from the raffle. Initially I grew it in a trough which it outgrew so I planted it on the rockery at work. Now over 30 years old it has twice seemed to give up the ghost and died back rather alarmingly so assuming the worst I simply chopped it hard back to a stump and on both occasions it grew away again.
It is very easy to propagate from cuttings and seems to be very hardy having taken temperatures down to around -15ºC.
These pictures were taken yesterday. It has really just started flowering. There is a hint of blue in this clone, others are normally more blue.

[Alisdair]

Yes, I do have Lithodora zahnii growing at our Greek house, quite a few plants on a near-vertical natural rock face, facing south. Here are pictures of five, taken in various years between January and March. With us flowering starts in November and goes on into April, but is usually at its peak in January and February. Individual plants remain in flower for many weeks.
The middle picture shows one that I planted a Cyclamen hederifolium under - the cyclamen enjoys the dense shade for its tuber and has no trouble pushing its leaves through on stems around a foot long.
John's remark about different clones having different flower colours: that squares up with what Kit Tan says in her superb book on the endemic plants of the Peloponnese. However, although some clones definitely have the potential to be a deeper blue than others, over the years I have begun to conclude that the flower colour can vary between near-white through blue to pink within each individual plant, depending on age of flower and on weather variations. So although a clone that is naturally pale will never produce darker flowers, a clone that is naturally more blue (as most are, in the wild) can vary from deepish blue to near-white or pink.

[Marilyn]

What a charming little shrub! The gentian blue of Lithodora diffusa is lovely too, of course, but I find it tends to be rather an unruly thing in mediterranean climates and flowers somewhat intermittently. It looks like this one has an altogether different habit; compact, well behaved and floriferous. In the first of your photos, Alisdair, there is something almost echium-like about it. Does it need acid soil? And can one get them going from seed?

[Alisdair]

Very happy in limestone, but can be found in slightly acid spots too. I've never tried from seed but will see if I can collect some later this year.

[Pescalune]

Hello John, Alisdair, Marilyn and other visitors of the MGS Forum,
Here in Languedoc, as well as around the coasts of the western Mediterraean sea, in April and May, we come across another species of gromwell in the garrigues, but its flowers are a more pronounced blue turning to purple as they fade; I suspect that the original blue colour betrays its kinship with the borage family.
Lithodora fruticosa is a lovely sub-shrub which will accept to settle in only the best drained part of your garden.
I wonder where Lithodora zahnii comes from; can you tell me a little more about it?
Jean

[John]

I believe it is endemic to the Mani in the Peloponnese, but I think I should let Alisdair tell you more of this!

[John]

Lithodora hispidula is from further east locally rare on Crete but common on Rhodes. The first picture is taken in the south of Rhodes where on this bank there were huge specimens. The other two are of it on Monte Smith right up at the northern tip of Rhodes just west of the city.

[Alisdair]

As John says Lithodora zahnii is restricted to a rather narrow range in the Mani peninsula of the Greek Peloponnese. I think our own house about halfway down is on or close to the southern limit of its range, and the northern limit is not much more than ten miles further north. Within that range it is more or less restricted to steep inhospitable rock faces and gullies.
It's an interesting plant as the stems are usually covered with a sort of calcareous deposit which it evidently extracts from the rocks it lives among.

[Pescalune]

Hello,
I celebrate my return to the MGS Forum by posting a new (spring 2016) photo of the Lithodora fruticosa that I had posted back in 2012.
The gentian blue of the flowers is still striking, but the plant has not grown much. But it still there, faithful to my garden, as we are all to our MGS.

(Added two days later)
As you can see, I have been unable to publish the photo of my Lithodora fruticosa; could anyone please tell me again how to publish a photo here ?
Many thanks in advance.

[Fleur Pavlidis]

And here is Jean's photo of a brilliant blue Lithodora fruticosa