Botanical name: Stachys byzantina ‍ ‍
Folk names: woolly hedgenettle, bears ears, bunny ears.

Type: Perennial

Wildlife: Pollen and nectar for bees and a special plant for helping solitary wool carder bees: a male patrols your plant against other male wool carders and his female mate harvests or ‘cards’ fibres from the leaf to make her nest for future bees.

Flowers: June to August

Decorative merit: Soft, silver-grey, hairy/ ‘wooly’ evergreen with small pink flowers arranged in whorls around spikes on stems up to 50cm. Basal leaves spread to form an evergreen mat, providing complimentary silver-grey foliage to a flower display.  

Where: Sun. Dry / gravel beds where it can spread in front of taller plants. Complements lavender.

Folklore: Native to Armenia, Iran and Turkey. Do you know of any folklore about lambs ear?

Mint family

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