Noble Knight Sage

Garden Sages are great plants, renowned for their stunning blue and purple flowers. Most are a bit tall and bulky, though, if you have a small garden or want to use them in planters. Galloping to your rescue is the Noble Knight Sage, a new, compact variety that tops out just under a foot tall, yet has long, showy spikes of large, violet-purple blooms that will steal your heart. In bloom from early May into August, it makes summer a time of color and beauty, and is so easy to grow anyone can succeed with it, even beginner gardeners. The bright green leaves have an interesting rough surface, and smell of sage and herbs (although not suitable for cooking), and every stem ends in a long flower spike, studded with flowers that open over weeks, neatly self-cleaning as they fade. Deadheading will keep new stems coming for months. A great plant that looks ‘right’ anywhere, and in any style of garden. Grow it in the front of perennial or shrub beds, in sunny woodland gardens, in meadow or prairie gardens, or in planter boxes – like the champion it is, the Noble Knight Sage will rescue your summer garden from the Ogre of Dullness.

• Bold spikes of large violet-purple flowers
• Compact plant barely a foot tall, ideal for containers and small gardens
• Three months of summer color, with deadheading
• Attracts butterflies and other pollinators, and a great bee plant
• Good drought tolerance once established – also deer and rabbit-proof

The Noble Knight Sage will grow best in full sun, but it will tolerate an hour or two of shade each day without problems. Plant it in any well-drained soil, of any kind, including drier, sandy soils and gravels. Rabbits and deer leave it alone and it almost never has pest or disease issues, making it great for new gardeners. Remove flowers spikes, but not the whole stem, when they stop sending out new blooms. This keeps new spikes coming. Cut the whole plant down to the ground in late fall – new growth will be back in spring, stronger and fuller.