History of the New World Salvias: Chapter 3

As I like this to be a very informative blog on salvias, I like to start on:

Something about the history,  of mainly the New World Salvias:

Salvia x jamensis ‘Pat Vlasto’ named after one of the pioneer growers of Salvias

Here in Britain we had Pat Vlasto, Beth Chatto, Beryl Davies (from former Probus Demonstration Garden in Cornwall) and later Christine Yeo to thank for the wonderful pioneering work the’d done with salvias!

We now have two lovely salvias to at least honour them in Salvia x jamensis ‘Pat Vlasto’ and Salvia ‘Christine Yeo’, which is, what I always believed,  a tough cross of   S. microphylla and S. chamaedryoides. 

The flowers are mostly purple but I also had sometimes violet flowering forms! Both Beryl Davies and Christine Yeo (part I & part II) have written some of the first little handbooks on salvias, which are rare and not easy to get hold off any more.

I had to have a read in John Sutton’s book: ‘the Gardener’s Guide to growing Salvias’ and discovered that:

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Yoke’s Magic Salvias: Chapter 2!

Salvia x jamensis ‘Peter Vidgeon’ AGM

Today I had the universe shining on me, as I think, …… but don’t say it too loud, just in case it is a dream?

I may have found some premises to grow my first few salvias!

We had a tip through the former boss of my partner to have a look and enquire at this nearby nursery, which has been a nursery since the 1920s, so we were told by the now sole owner there since 2001! She rents out all the various buildings and polytunnels on site and also makes a living of breeding poultry, ducks and peacocks / hens.

She showed us the entire site and then we walked into a vacant tunnel which had a 10 meter x 1.80 meter (?) propagation bench in it, which will be perfect to start my collection!

Can’t wait to start buying in my ‘Mum’ plants!

I already know that I would like to grow most of the same ones I used to have at Rodbaston College and I’ve tracked many of them down to several nearby nurseries.

More later!

The Salvia: Chapter 1

Welcome to my new venture:

Salvia ‘Hot Lips’ is an unusual ‘fun’ salvia with white, red or, when it behaves: two-toned flowers!

This year I would like to start a whole new ‘New World Salvia collection’!

First this will be virtual on my blog, but hopefully I will soon be able to grow all these lovely plants into a fantastic collection in reality! I have used this signal red colour as many salvia flowers are of this colour.  Like the popular variety above, which has the funny bi-colour! But there are also many blue ones or violet and pink or do we call it maroon or purple (!) and yellow as well as all other colours in between!

They are beautiful: grown for their very vivid colours, mostly flowering en masse, for long periods on end and they are easy to fit into any area of your garden or grown into a container on your patio.

Another less known fact is that the foliage often has a delicious fruity fragrance.

I like to tell you all about them….

My love affair with the Salvias began in the last century; in  1998 to be precise!

This is since I became Head Gardener at Rodbaston College, which is now after amalgamation with 3 other colleges in the County, known as South Staffordshire College, Rodbaston Campus near Stafford in the U.K.

The collection had been started by the former Head Gardener,  with the then Head of Horticulture , who both thought it would be a good idea for the College to have a National Collection and they decided it should be the genus Salvia.

Salvia semiatrata is an unusual tender Salvia found in Oaxaca, Mexico

But when I started to get to know the genus and in particular the New World ones with all its different species, cultivars and hybrids I  slowly built it up to be ‘National Collection of New World Salvias’, which it gained official status in 2002.

Three expeditions to southern Mexico, mainly in the State of Oaxaca and the organisation of a Salvia Study Day at the College got me more and more hooked. I made several very influential friends in the Salvia world to which I still owe my gratitude.

My story below mentions several very influential people in the Salvia world and in particular in Britain. I have copied some information from several books about salvias, as these are often in better words then what I can write myself. You’ll find links for these books, so you can purchase them yourself  if you want! They are certainly worth it if you get hooked!

Continue reading “The Salvia: Chapter 1”