Pseudodictamnus hirsutus

Pseudodictamnus hirsutus is a small, densely white-woolly subshrub of the mint family native to the eastern Mediterranean, particularly Greece, the Aegean islands, Crete, Cyprus and southwestern Turkey, where it grows on dry limestone hillsides, rocky slopes and phrygana scrubland. It forms low, rounded mounds 20-50 cm tall, with much-branched stems that are clothed, like the rest of the plant, in soft, dense, silvery-white tomentum, giving the whole shrub a greyish-felted appearance. The opposite, broadly ovate to almost orbicular leaves are 1-3 cm long, with crenate margins and a sage-like aromatic scent when bruised. In summer the stems bear several well-spaced compact verticillasters of small, two-lipped pale pink to whitish flowers held within conspicuous, broad, papery, almost saucer-like calyces, an ornamental feature that has earned the genus the common name false-dittany.