"La Reine de la Cite' des Phoques (Liz Day)" <[log in to unmask]> writes:
>We have a perennial mint in our garden called (according to the
>landscaper) *Elsholtzia sauntonii*  (??).  It vaguely resembles Monarda,
>grows about 4' high, blooms late in the summer with dull purple flower
>spikes that look a bit like caterpillars.  Bumblebees are CRAZY for
>this plant.  Every night last season it was covered with sleeping bees.
>A real draw.
>Is anyone out there familiar with this plant?  It is not in our big fat
>all-inclusive perennial book, and the landscapers do not answer their
>phone.
>It seems harmless ( I mean horticulturally) but from long experience I
>know not to assume so.
 
Here's what The Practical Encyclopedia of Gardening (1936 edition) says
about Elsholtzia:
 
"A genus of 20 species of chiefly Asiatic, aromatic under-shrubs of
the mint family, E. stauntoni somewhat grown for its late-blooming
flowers. It is a low shrub or shrubby herb, 2-4 ft. high, its
opposite leaves short-stalked, toothed, oval-oblong, 3-5in long, and
sticky beneath.  Flowers lavender, in a dense, 1-sided spike, 6-12 in
long. Corolla only slightly 2-lipped its stamens long-protruding.
The plant is easily grown in the open border south of zone 4 and
blooms in Sept-Oct.  Choose a sunny place and propagate by greenwood
cuttings or by seed. (Named for Johann Sigismund Elsholtz, Prussian
physician and botanist.)"
 
Sounds like a nice plant.  Want to send us some seeds next season?
 
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