Verbascum Species, Greek Mullein, Olympic Mullein, Wild Verbascum

Wonderful plant if you have the room. (And if you don’t, you should make room!)

Just for accuracy, this plant is not nat...Read Moreive to Greece. The confusion comes from the name “olympicum;” although it does refer to a Mt. Olympus, it’s not the most familiar one. This one is the Bithynian Olympus, modern-day Uludağ, near Bursa in northwestern Turkey. Verbascum bombyciferum, another wonderful plant, is also endemic to the same mountain.

Greeks tended to give the name Olympus to the tallest mountain wherever they lived; there are two more even in Greece that I can think of, on Mytilene and Karpathos.

Greece does have some enormous mulleins of its own however. V. speciosum is huge and makes massive inflorescences. Overall it’s a somewhat coarser plant than
V. olympicum but if you just want some hugeness, it’s worth tracking down.

These are amazing for us in SE Virginia, zone 7b. Blooming at 7 feet tall for about a month.

I have several of these in my very sandy, hot, dry garden (zone 4). The largest is approx. 6 feet tall and has been in bloom since late J...Read Moreune. The plants have been perennial for me, the original plant has been in the garden for 4 years. The bloom on the largest is covered with bees all morning and into the afternoon, when many of the flowers seem to close for the night.

A tall, evergreen perennial from Greece.

Has large, lance shaped leaves densely covered with grey/white hairs. Has a tall,...Read More woolly flowers spike that branches out into several spikes. Bears bright, clear, yellow flowers with paler yellow to white filaments.

Flowers June - September

Loves a well-drained, preferably alkaline soil in full sun. Will need staking in rich soil. Dislikes winter wet.

Takes a couple of years to flower and while it is technically a perennial it is often monocarpic.