Pronounciation: Te-u-CRI-um cha-MA-dres

Hardiness zones
Sunset 4-24
USDA 5-11

Landscape Use: Ground cover, low edging or short informal hedge plant, perennial herb for sensory gardens.

Form & Character: Mounding and spreading, clean-looking, tough, and aromatic.

Growth Habit: Evergreen, semi-woody, broadleaf (actually small leaves) perennial subshrub, moderate growth rate to 12- to 18-inches tall, spreading moderately by rhizomes and stolons to 4-feet wide.

Foliage/Texture: Opposite, ovate, yellowish to dark green, glabrous on adaxial surface with dentate margins outer half of leaf margin, leaves 1/2-inch long with short petiole; medium fine texture.

Flowers & Fruits: Small (corolla to 3/8 inch), white to pale pinkish purple, axillary flowers during May.

Seasonal Color: Modest display of flowers during late spring.

Temperature: Hardy to 0^oF. In Phoenix, germander struggles before establishment if summer temperatures exceed 105^oF and it is grown in an open setting with inorganic surface mulches such as as decomposing granite.

Light: Full sun to partial shade. No reflected western summer sun in Phoenix.

Soil: Tolerant

Watering: In Phoenix, give infrequent to regular supplemental water from spring to fall, but generally none is required during the winter.

Pruning: Lightly shear or head back once a year during late winter to promote dense habit of growth. Germander does not respond well to severe pruning.

Propagation: Stem and root cuttings (for nursery production) and division (for home owners and gardeners).

Disease and Pests: None

Additional comments: Germander is a clean-looking herbal subshrub that is generally moderately slow to establish in Phoenix landscapes that are mesic (well irrigated and green). Germander does not grow well in Phoenix in dry, xeric, or desert landscape settings. Instead, it grows well when protected by being in close proximity to other landscape vegetation. Attracts bees when in flower. Two cultivated varieties of note are 'Prostratum' and 'Summer Sunshine'.

Ethnobotanical perspectives: This small plant was once highly esteemed as a treatment for gout, inflammation, respiratory ailments. Germander is also used for its diuretic properties, and as a treatment for weak stomachs and lack of appetite. It has been taken as an aid to weight loss and is a common ingredient in tonic wines. Some caution is advised when ingesting this plant, as it can cause liver damage. Germander is widely used in making alcoholic drinks with a bitter base.

Taxonomic musings: Teucrium chamaedrys has a surprising amount of clinal variation. The are at least 15 recognized subspecies. And in the genus, Teucrium, there are over 300 species worldwide. One of then is Teucrium fruticans (bush germander), which is also sometimes found in local Phoenix nurseries. It has gray tomentose leaves, light blue flowers (the cultivar 'Azureum'), and is an upright shrub to 5 feet in height that also aromatic and attracts bees.