HELICHRYSUM petiolatum (=H. petiolare)

Interesting ground cover, perennial and evergreen, with a very fast development and dense cushion-like habit, belonging to the Asteraceae family and native to South Africa: when fully developed it does not exceed 50 cm in height, while it can expand in width even up to 1.50 m . Lignified and densely branched at the base, it has thin creeping stems which, orienting in every direction and branching further, give the plant a soft, thick pulvinate shape; numerous small leaves are grafted onto the branches, alternating and round, with an attractive silver-grey color, linked to the presence of a microscopic down, a characteristic tomentum that extends to cover the stems as well. Between late spring and mid-summer, long peduncles crowned by small, gathered hemispherical inflorescences, formed by tiny yellow flowers, wrapped in layers of creamy white papyrus bracts rise from the apex of many branches.

Extremely rustic, it loves sunny positions and prefers poor, arid, stony and well-drained soils: to avoid water stagnation which can quickly cause the plant to collapse. It bears saltiness of coastal gardens, while it hardly tolerates the cold, especially intense and prolonged or associated with high environmental humidity. During the planting phase it may be useful to irrigate regularly; later it is able to overcome even long periods of drought. In spring it is possible to intervene by eliminating cluttered branches, dry or broken and performing a shortening of even 1/3 of the stems to allow a more dense and harmonious development. suitable to cultivation in large pots and containers of hanging gardens, where it will reveal its elegant drooping posture, in the open ground in Mediterranean gardens it can find a place in rocks, on the edge of dry stone walls and at the base of bushes or create, alone or with similar essences with contrasting foliage, simple and easy highly decorative borders.