Salvia moorcroftiana - Sage

Salvia moorcroftiana, the Moorcroft sage, is a Himalayan species with particularly woolly foliage and architectural flowering. Its large grey-green rosette is decorative before flowering. Its branched flowering stems appear in late spring or summer, bearing pale mauve flowers with green bracts. Grow this perennial sage in full sun, in well-drained but not too dry soil. This plant resembles clary sage.

This wild species belongs to the Lamiaceae family. It is native to the western Himalayas, widespread from eastern Afghanistan to western Nepal, present in Pakistan, Kashmir and northwestern India. In the wild, it grows on open slopes, rocky terrain and high-altitude fallow land, between 1,500 and 2,700m altitude. It is a herbaceous perennial. The foliage is deciduous; it dries before winter. The plant first develops large basal leaves, long-petioled, ovate to heart-shaped, strongly puckered and bordered with rounded or irregular teeth. Their surface is covered with white hairs, which gives the rosette a woolly appearance, almost felt-like. The flowering stems are erect, robust, quadrangular in cross-section as in many Lamiaceae, branched in their upper part. They rise to 60-90cm above the rosette, which measures 60 to 80cm wide. The flowers are grouped in whorls on branched inflorescences. Each pale lilac to lilac blue corolla has an elongated tube and a curved upper lip. The hairy calyces and green bracts are clearly visible around the flowers. Flowering occurs from May to July depending on climate. This sage is hardy down to -12 to -15 °C in very well-drained soil; winter dampness is more harmful to its crown than dry cold.
The species name commemorates William Moorcroft, a British traveller who collected this plant in the Ladakh region in the early 19th century.

Plant this sage in a large, not-too-dry rock garden or in a sunny, but not scorching, border with other perennials with a wild appearance. Alongside it, you can plant Nepeta grandiflora ‘Dawn to Dusk’ for its pale pink spikes, mullein or Verbascum chaixii ‘Album’ white and very vertical, Eryngium giganteum and Salvia sclarea ‘Vatican White’.