Icterina Golden Sage

Other Names: Common Sage, Culinary Sage

Ornamental Features:

Icterina Golden Sage features beautiful racemes of fragrant lilac purple flowers with blue overtones rising above the foliage from early to mid summer, which are most effective when planted in groupings. The flowers are excellent for cutting. It's attractive fragrant narrow leaves are grayish green in colour with showy gold variegation. As an added bonus, the foliage turns a gorgeous purple in the fall. The fruit is not ornamentally significant.

Landscape Attributes:

Icterina Golden Sage is an herbaceous perennial with an upright spreading habit of growth. Its medium texture blends into the garden, but can always be balanced by a couple of finer or coarser plants for an effective composition.

This is a relatively low maintenance perennial, and can be pruned at anytime. It is a good choice for attracting butterflies, hummingbirds and bees to your yard, but is not particularly attractive to deer who tend to leave it alone in favor of tastier treats. It has no significant negative characteristics.

Icterina Golden Sage is recommended for the following landscape applications;

• General Garden Use
• Mass Planting
• Border Edging
• Container Planting
• Herb Gardens
• Naturalizing And Woodland Gardens

Plant Characteristics:

Icterina Golden Sage will grow to be about 18 inches tall at maturity extending to 24 inches tall with the flowers, with a spread of 18 inches. It grows at a medium rate, and under ideal conditions can be expected to live for approximately 9 years.

This perennial 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 a low-water garden or xeriscape application. It is not particular as to soil pH, but grows best in rich soils. It is somewhat tolerant of urban pollution. Consider applying a thick mulch around the root zone in winter to protect it in exposed locations or colder zones. This plant can be propagated by seed.

This is a selected variety of a species not originally from North America.