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devolet

Is This Catnip?

devolet
9 years ago

And if so which one?

Comments (12)

  • iris_gal
    9 years ago

    Looks like Ajuga to me.

  • devolet
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    They do look similar to ajuga reptans in this image, but foliage is not crinkly, it is smooth. I do have ajuga but it's larger. These plants are very petite with tiny foliage that is tear drop shaped and it dies back in winter after going to seed, turning completely black. Ajuga sticks around for me. It was a volunteer from the neighbors garden that she was trying to dig up because she said it was a weed from Hades. It is also very suppressing to anything around it.

  • iris_gal
    9 years ago

    Interesting. It's leaves are not catnip. Maybe it's some type of Salvia?

    All my salvias are evergreen in zone 9.

  • teckelhound
    9 years ago

    This plant looks identical to my ajuga "Chocolate Chip". At this point all the blooms have dried up and I am left with brownish dried stumps where the once beautiful flower stems stood. With average water, they do very well in full sun. It's my recollection that spring is the biggest flush of flowering, but maybe there are some repeat blooms with adequate water. I generally try to keep the garden on the lower end of adequate moisture but I have a feeling mine would flower more with extra water but my goal is to just keep the leaves from burning up in the sun over the summer.

  • Shorty_CA
    9 years ago

    I have ajuga and catnip volunteering in my yard. The catnip leaves are much larger. Catnip also grows taller than the ajuga even with the blooms.

    In Zone 10 ajuga is a perennial.

    I already have an invisible sign in front of my house that says "all stray cats welcome here" so I try to pull the catnip as soon as I see it.

  • Errant_gw
    9 years ago

    Yep, looks just like the Ajuga in my yard, and nothing like catnip.

  • Min3 South S.F. Bay CA
    9 years ago

    totally off topic... but, elysianfields, last year you wrote on another thread; "I put in a sage recommended by a lady shopping at the garden center who merely said that stuff I was looking at is great, she whacks the blank out of it and it comes right back. My sort of plant..."
    i would like to know the name of that sage if it worked well for you. thanks, min

  • devolet
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    The sage was called Hot Lips Min, Salvia x microphylla grahamii per the look up on the web. The flowers are red and white and look like lips, though I had two other colors of similar sages because I bought three plants. I don't have the names of the others but they looked like the same plant, just with different flowers. And you truly could whack the blank out of it and it came right back fresh and sassy. The sage I have left in the garden now is called pineapple sage and it flowers red, the foliage smells like pineapple. I got that from a garden I restored for someone else. Hot lips was from Home Depot.

  • Min3 South S.F. Bay CA
    9 years ago

    Thanks Fields! You won't believe how fast I am going to acquire some of those.
    I got a sage last week ...from a nursery!... very UNhelpfully tagged "Sage Autumn (red)". The worker had no answers. I am wondering why they are called Autumn- maybe they grow later in the year than others, more frost resistant? It has plain red flowers but my hummers don't care what the name is, they just want lots more.
    Do you have any sages in pots and if so, how well do they do in them?
    PS. I got a catnip too and it is doing very well in a pot. I don't dare let it loose.

  • hoovb zone 9 sunset 23
    9 years ago

    Autumn sage is the common name for Salvia greggii.

  • Min3 South S.F. Bay CA
    9 years ago

    Thanks Hoov- you'd think they could put that info on the tag! Min

  • devolet
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    I've never grown sage in pots because they get rather large. They come back from trimming pretty easy anyways. Mine are in the ground.