Botany
Salvia divinorum has large green ovate (oftentimes also dentate) leaves, with a yellow undertone that reach 10 to 30 cm (4 to 12 in) long. The leaves have no hairs on either surface, and little or no petiole. The plant grows to well over 1 metre (3 ft) in height, on hollow square stems which tend to break or trail on the ground, with the plant rooting quite readily at the nodes and internodes.
The flowers, which bloom only rarely, grow in whorls on a 30-centimetre (12 in) inflorescence, with about six flowers to each whorl. The 3-centimetre (1.2 in) flowers are white, curved and covered with hairs, and held in a small violet calyx that is covered in hairs and glands. When it does bloom in its native habitat, it does so from September to May.
Early authors erred in describing the flowers as having blue corollas, based on Epling and Játiva's description. The first plant material they received was dried, so they based the flower color on an erroneous description by Hofmann and Wasson, who didn't realize that their "blue flowers, crowned with a white dome" were in fact violet calyces with unopened white corollas.
Read more about this topic: Salvia Divinorum
Famous quotes containing the word botany:
“...some sort of false logic has crept into our schools, for the people whom I have seen doing housework or cooking know nothing of botany or chemistry, and the people who know botany and chemistry do not cook or sweep. The conclusion seems to be, if one knows chemistry she must not cook or do housework.”
—Ellen Henrietta Swallow Richards (1842–1911)