Other Names:  Felt-leaved Yerba Santa

Description:

A native California shrub featuring thick, fragrant, gray-green foliage with a coat of woolly hairs; clusters of lavender bell flowers appear in spring, attracting pollinators; a great plant for sunny borders or butterfly gardens

Ornamental Features

Thickleaf Yerba Santa features showy clusters of lightly-scented lavender bell-shaped flowers with white eyes at the ends of the branches from late winter to mid spring. It has attractive grayish green foliage with hints of silver which emerges gray in spring. The large fuzzy oval leaves are highly ornamental and remain grayish green throughout the winter. The smooth coppery-bronze bark adds an interesting dimension to the landscape.

Landscape Attributes

Thickleaf Yerba Santa is an open multi-stemmed evergreen shrub with an upright spreading habit of growth. Its relatively coarse texture can be used to stand it apart from other landscape plants with finer foliage.

This is a relatively low maintenance shrub, and should only be pruned after flowering to avoid removing any of the current season's flowers. It is a good choice for attracting bees, butterflies and hummingbirds to your yard, but is not particularly attractive to deer who tend to leave it alone in favor of tastier treats. Gardeners should be aware of the following characteristic(s) that may warrant special consideration;

• Spreading
• Suckering
• Self-Seeding

Thickleaf Yerba Santa is recommended for the following landscape applications;

• Mass Planting
• Hedges/Screening
• Rock/Alpine Gardens
• General Garden Use
• Naturalizing And Woodland Gardens

Planting & Growing

Thickleaf Yerba Santa will grow to be about 10 feet tall at maturity, with a spread of 6 feet. It has a low canopy with a typical clearance of 1 foot from the ground, and is suitable for planting under power lines. It grows at a medium rate, and under ideal conditions can be expected to live for approximately 20 years. As this plant tends to go dormant in summer, it is best interplanted with late-season bloomers to hide the dying foliage.

This shrub should only be grown in full sunlight. It prefers dry to average moisture levels with very well-drained soil, and will often die in standing water. It is considered to be drought-tolerant, and thus makes an ideal choice for xeriscaping or the moisture-conserving landscape. It is not particular as to soil pH, but grows best in sandy soils, and is able to handle environmental salt. It is somewhat tolerant of urban pollution. This species is native to parts of North America.