It's Salvia season at LongHouse!  Check out our new Salvia collection in the Pink Garden.  All Salvia cultivars are nicely labeled.  We planted many new S. pratensis hybrids that were just cut back to produce a vigorous second flor.  And all S. nemorosa cultivars are in full bloom and at their best right now.

Their spiky flowers add much lightness to any planting and the bees are crazy for Salvias!  Their nectar makes a very distinct honey flavor, that is second to no other.

Hybridizing Salvias has come a long way.  In the early '50s, my uncle Ernst Pagels selected Salvia "Eastfriesland" from a package of seed that his mentor Karl Foerster gave him when Pagels left Bornim to start his own nursery in East Friesland.

But this was only the beginning.  Over the next 60 years, Pagels hybridized more than 15 named varieties, many of them are still in the market.  You might have a few growing in your own garden.  Shown here are "Snowhills," "Bluehills," "Wesuwe," "Ruegen," "Negrito," and "Amethyst."