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Glite Dictionary
🌱 Woolly plant 🌿 Aromatic plant
pitcher sage

pitcher sage

9.9
A tall California plant that lives many years with fragrant leaves and pale blue or violet flowers
  • noun
  • /ˈpɪtʃər seɪdʒ/
  • Specialized
translation icon : salvia de jarro
  • The pitcher sage is prized in native gardens for its fragrant foliage and showy flowers.

Examples

  • Gardeners appreciate pitcher sage because it attracts hummingbirds and bees.

  • We saw several clusters of pitcher sage growing along the hillside trail.

  • The pitcher sage thrives in sunny areas.

  • I love the smell of pitcher sage in the garden.

  • Gardeners appreciate pitcher sage because it attracts hummingbirds and bees.

  • The pitcher sage is prized in native gardens for its fragrant foliage and showy flowers.

  • We saw several clusters of pitcher sage growing along the hillside trail.

Synonyms

Lepechinia calycina
vspitcher sage
  • Specialized
9.9

A plant from California that lives for many years with woolly stems and large white flowers called pitcher sage

is the common everyday name rather than the formal species label

Surface Forms

pitcher sage singular
pitcher sages plural

Morphology

pitcher + sage

The compound is compositionally a type of 'sage', so a B1 learner who knows 'pitcher' and 'sage' can infer it denotes a plant related to sage (i.e., a kind of sage). However, the precise botanical sense of 'pitcher' here is specialized and the specific species/features (woolly stems, large white flowers) are not predictable from the constituents, so the relation is only partly transparent.

Etymology

Pitcher sage may come from the way its flowers or leaf parts form a small cup or jug like a pitcher, and sage is the common name for fragrant herbs. So the name helps you picture a fragrant plant with pitcher-shaped parts.