Salvia jamensis Mighty Pink’ Malabar®

Salvia Malabar® or Mighty Pink is a variety of shrubby sage that offers larger flowers than most other shrubby sages; in bloom from spring to autumn, with a bubblegum pink that evokes the chewing gum of our childhood. It is very decorative in beds, borders and containers. It is a small, nectar-rich shrub, drought-tolerant and fairly hardy in well-drained soil.

This sage belongs to the Lamiaceae family and the horticultural group of Mexican shrubby sages, combining Salvia microphylla, S. greggii and their hybrid Salvia × jamensis. Malabar®, or ‘Mighty Pink’, is a cultivar distributed in France by Cerdys. 
The plant forms a bush branching from the base, with flexible and erect stems. Its growth is rapid in the first year. In the ground, it reaches 60 to 80 cm in height and 50 to 70 cm in spread, while in a pot, it remains between 45 and 60 cm. The flowers are borne in loose spikes; they have a bright pink two-lipped corolla with a paler throat, accompanied by a burgundy calyx. Fowering begins in May-June and renews until frost if faded flowers are removed. It is nectar-rich and loved by bees. 
The foliage consists of ovate to lanceolate, 1 to 3 cm long, slightly toothed, medium to dark green leaves. It is very aromatic when crushed and can persist in winter depending on the climate. The quadrangular stems are green to purplish when young. The hardiness of this cultivar is around −10 to −12 °C.

Place the Malabar® Shrubby Sage in a sunny bed or in a 7 to 12 litre pot. You can pair it with grey foliage, for example, lavandins, Santolina chamaecyparissus and Perovskia atriplicifolia 'Little Spire'. Also mix different varieties of shrubby sages with matching colours: Gletsjer (white), Violette de Loire® (dark violet) and Pink Lips (bicolour pink and white).

The original home of small-leaved shrubby sages is in the sierras of northern and central Mexico, where populations naturally form hybrids described under the name × jamensis. The genus name Salvia derives from the Latin salvus, meaning "healthy". Shrubby sages reached Europe from Mexican collections in the 1990s. The epithet × jamensis refers to the Jamé or Jalpa sector in Mexico, where these hybrid populations were described.