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Salvia x 'Magic Wand'
Salvia x 'Magic Wand'

(Magic Wand Sage) Salvia x ‘Magic Wand’ is perky with vertical spikes of long blooming, rich purple flowers and dense, mid-green foliage. Overall, it reminds us of Salvia x ‘Big Blue’, but has smaller flowers and usually doesn’t grow as tall.

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Results for doesn from the blog

1. Guide to Understanding & Using Fertilizer
Identifying the kind of fertilizer your flowers need can be a trial-and-error experience. This is especially true if you are growing plants that don’t thrive in fertile soils like loam.  Flowers by the Sea Online Nursery hopes to clear up some of the confusion in this Guide to Understanding and Using Fertilizer .
Quick Digs
2. Quick Digs: Wintering Over Salvias Indoors
For some gardeners, bringing outdoor plants inside during winter is a practical matter. You want to save money. For others, plants are a bit like pets. You feel tender about your tender perennials and can't bear to think of a lovely sage dying from exposure to harsh weather.  This fourth article in our Quick Digs series on preparation for winter in the Salvia garden suggests ways to overwinter sages indoors.
Sage Words About Wildlife
3. Sage Words About Wildlife: Do Deer Devour Salvia?
Salvias are not a favorite food for deer. However, they will eat some when plants they consider tasty are in short supply. There is no such thing as deer-proof plants, but you can limit deer damage to your landscaping and vegetable garden by planting lots of sages and other plants that aren't among deer favorites.
Xeric Choices
4. Colorful Salvias Break Myth of Dry Garden Drabness
Dry gardens are flowerbeds or entire landscapes based on ornamental perennials that require little to no watering once well rooted. Many Salvias are excellent, drought-resistant choices for these gardens. Flowers by the Sea Farm and Online Nursery talks about dry garden myths as well as low-water plants. 
Getting Started with Salvias
5. Getting Started: Salvias for the Coastal Southeast
True sages are members of the Salvia genus and number in the hundreds. They are native to a wide variety of environments worldwide, which is why some are ideal for the dry gardens of California and others can handle the abundant moisture of the American Southeast. Flowers by the Sea raises many sages that grow well in the Southeast, including some that are either native to the region or have jumped fences from gardens into the wild.
Book Reviews
6. Book Review: Nature-Friendly Garden by Marlene A. Condon
Reading Marlene A. Condon's Nature-Friendly Garden is like observing a game of toppling dominoes. All the pieces are lined up standing on end in a complex, maze-like pattern. Flick one domino and the whole structure tumbles. Similarly, the author shows how simple choices we make in our gardens have consequences that can build or destroy wildlife habitat.
Sage Experts
7. Sage Experts: How Dr. Dufresne Became the Sultan of Salvia
December 18, 2018 - With great sadness we have learned that our friend Rich as passed away at his home in Candor, NC. A chance encounter with Pineapple Sage led organic chemist Dr. Richard F. Dufresne to become one of America's leading Salvia researchers. Sage Experts focuses on specialists -- both professionals and amateurs -- who have helped popularize the Salvia genus. Dufresne's life course changed the day he visited Rhode Island's Biodynamic Meadowbrook Herb Farm. Discovering the heady pineapple fragrance of Salvia elegans at Meadowbrook gave him a cause.
8. Sage Experts: How Robin Middleton's Gardens Bloomed
Sage Experts focuses on Salvia specialists -- both amateurs and professionals -- in settings ranging from home gardens to university laboratories. This article concerns Robin Middleton of Surrey, England, and his popular Robins Salvias website. The longtime horticulturist grows more than 100 Salvia species and cultivars in his garden and greenhouses.
Xeric Choices
9. Drought Praise: Around the World with Sunny Groundcovers
Bring on the sun. Bring on the heat. Bring on the drought-resistant Salvia groundcovers.Flowers by the Sea offers a short list of top groundcovers from around the world for fighting drought. They come from Asia, California, Mexico and Morocco in lavender, purple and pink to do battle against the boring brown caused by water shortage. Similar to gravel, bark chip or pine needle mulch, these groundcovers discourage weeds, cool soil, conserve moisture and add color to gardens. They are living mulch.
Quick Digs
10. Quick Digs: Improving Soil for Spring in Salvia Gardens
This is the fifth article in our Quick Digs series about getting ready for spring in Salvia gardens. The previous post talked about weed control. Now we dig into soil and amendments, which aren't just additions to legal documents. The word also refers to materials added to soil to improve its structure and chemistry. These include organic matter, such as compost, as well as chemical fertilizers and minerals (lime and crushed rock are examples). Choices depend on the plants you want to grow and the current make-up of your garden soil.
Sage Words About Wildlife
11. Sage Words About Wildlife: Climate Change Alters Hummingbird Migration
Nature doesn't come to a sudden, overall halt, when the timing of its ecosystems slip, including ones involving hummingbirds. Instead, change occurs gradually. Plants and the animals that pollinate them have coevolved to meet each other's needs. You can help by planting hummingbird habitat in your home garden. Learn more in the Everything Salvias Blog at FBTS Online Nursery.
12. Texas and Southwestern Native Plants for Butterflies, Honeybees and Hummingbirds
Many gardeners and wildlife lovers in states with recurrent drought choose to increase the number of native plants in their yards. This is especially true of Texas, where statewide drought began in 2010 and hasn't yet abated. Native plants appeal to local wildlife, including pollinators. To help gardeners from Texas and the Southwest who want to create wildlife habitat, Flowers by the Sea (FBTS) suggests Salvias appropriate for Texas and Southwest gardens.