Also, oddly, it's not sage. It happens to smell similar to sage, though, and hence the name.
This plant is not happy. It hasn't been since the day I got it. It turns out this is because it really wants to be an outdoor plant and not live in a pot. Which raises the question: what difference does it make whether plants live indoors or outdoors? If they're in a pot that's large enough that their roots can expand as needed and still be surrounded on all sides by dirt, and if they get sunlight (albeit through glass) for as many hours a day as they would outdoors, what difference does it make?
Since glass blocks UV rays, I looked into whether UV rays are needed for the photosynthetic process or otherwise. According to what I read, not only are they not necessary for photosynthesis, but at higher levels they actually impede photosynthesis (for reasons I'm not going to get into here).
Of course, unless I tote them around the apartment at different times of day, they don't really get sun for as many hours as they would if they were outside.
Also, the man at the farmer's market who I love so much said that the ground outside buffers extreme changes in moisture -- which some plants are not very well equipped to handle -- by offering a large amount of surrounding earth for water to soak into after rainfall. Whereas when I water a small pot of dirt, all the water just sits right there soaking into the roots of the plant.
I'm going to go with that explanation for now.
So I'm attempting a modified watering system in which I water the plant some from the top but some from the bottom, by putting water in its dish to be absorbed, and use less water at a time but more frequently.
The confounding factor is that this plant also probably needs more sun than it's getting inside (see above), but it's too cold lately to put it outside.
Phylum/division: Magnoliophyta
Class: Magnoliopsida
Order: Lamiales
Family: Lamiaceae
Genus: Perovskia
Species: P. atriplicifolia
