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Salvias...what am i doing wrong?

sanjy67sanjy67 Posts: 1,007

i bought a salvia 'mystic spires' the year before last and it was amazing, flowering all summer, i cut it back half way through summer for continued beautiful flowering. At the end of autumn i cut it back (too far i feared, 3inches from ground) i know! i just got carried away.... anyway the next year by may it hadn't done anything by way of showing it was alive, so i threw it image

Last year i decided to buy another one as i'd loved mystic spires so much, it flowered but on not such a grand scale as the previous years plant, i also bought a salvia 'armistaad' flowered really well, took care of them but at the end of the year thought i would leave all the old growth on this time to protect it over the winter, i have now cut it back not as harshly as my first year but to about 12inches but both show no sign of life again, just woody stumps, will they come back from the ground/ woody branches and if so when?

what am i doing wrong with them ?

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  • Busy-LizzieBusy-Lizzie Posts: 24,023

    I usually lose them in the winter too. One Amistad survived one winter, but it's dead now. I think the best thing is to take cuttings and keep them indoors over winter.

    Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
  • fidgetbonesfidgetbones Posts: 17,617

    I had an Amistad survive the winter last year. I had taken cuttings. It emerged from below ground and eventually flowered long after the cuttings had. I dug one up, and took cuttings this last winter. They are in the greeenhouse. The potted one is behind the cuttings, so I intend to start fresh from cuttings each year now.

  • darren636darren636 Posts: 666
    Salvias aren't particularly hardy.

    Cold and wet can easily do them in.



    Cuttings or dig them up and treat as pelargonium over winter.
  • WintersongWintersong Posts: 2,436

    Don't know if slugs and snails are a problem in your garden?  Salvias get gnarly woody bases from which new shoots appear quite early, mine pop up about March unprotected but I know that slugs and snails will be on them straight away, the tiny buds are snack size and tasty image

    I've used pellets previous years,  this year it's been every cold rainy evening from March onwards, and my Salvias are loving me for it image

  • Lou12Lou12 Posts: 1,149

    Yes we have a slug problem with new buds too, I've certainly had to put slug pellets round this year. Once the plant is big it's fine.

  • punkdocpunkdoc Posts: 15,039

    Amistad is not hardy, here in Sheffield. I take cuttings, and dig up the parents, and keep them in a cold greenhouse over winter. So far so good, they are all showing new growth.

    How can you lie there and think of England
    When you don't even know who's in the team

    S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border
  • LynLyn Posts: 23,190

    I had two new ones last year, Hot Pink and Black and Blue, the pink has survived the winter, no sign of the Black, but I did take cuttings from both.

    the Hot lips always survives.

    Gardening on the wild, windy west side of Dartmoor. 

  • Busy-LizzieBusy-Lizzie Posts: 24,023

    My Hot Lips died, yet it was a milder than usual winter.

    Dordogne and Norfolk. Clay in Dordogne, sandy in Norfolk.
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