How to identify different lavenders

I’ve always wanted a lavender garden. Its refreshing scent conjure images of a picture perfect flower garden!
So, when I saw pots of lavender sitting on a tray of plants at a local nursery, I didn’t need to think twice.
I got a couple of pots into a basket straight away without wondering how to identify different lavenders.

Introduction

When I bought them, I didn’t pay much attention to the name of the lavender as I knew there were a lot of different species on the market, and honestly I was happy to get any type of lavender!

After a while I became a little more interested in the different types of lavender that is available on the market.
I thought it would be awesome if I could learn to identify the different types of lavender.

Of course, in hindsight, that was a bit ambitious… Nevertheless, Google became my best friend, and as I’ll show you below, I’ve become familiar with four notable lavender types.

Lavender and bee
(Image by shell_ghostcage from Pixabay)

Side-note:

After purchasing the lavender at the nursery, I learnt that I had purchased lavender dentata (French lavender).

According to the accompanying name tag it can grow up to 5 feet (1.5 meters) if not pruned.

It blooms all seasons except for summer, which is odd as it is still blooming during summer here in the Blue Mountains, Australia.
This is probably because the mountains are at a higher altitude and tend to have a lower temperature even during summer time.

Lavender Field Image by Hans Braxmeier from Pixabay

Like almost everybody does, I googled and figured out how to distinguish between different species.

As you may know, there are many different types of lavender.

I was pleasantly surprised when I found out that there were in fact roughly forty different species of lavender!

I selected four main species to introduce here as they seem to be easily purchased at any nursery.

Here we go:

How to identify different lavenders?

*Lavandula Stoechas

It’s known as Spanish lavender, flowers are pink to purple, 12 – 40 inches (30-100 cm) tall, blooming in Spring to early Summer

lavandula-qngustifolia — **Lavandula angustifolia**
(Image by Hans Braxmeier from Pixabay)

*Lavandula angustifolia

It’s known as English lavender, flowers are pinkish purple, 12 – 35 inches (30-90cm) tall, blooming in late Spring to late Summer

*Lavandula X intermedia

It’s known as lavandin, a hybrid cross between lavandula angustifolia and lavandula latifolia, flowers are purple, grow up to 40 inches (1 m) tall, blooming in early July to late Summer

*Lavandula latifolia

It’s known as broad-leaved lavender or spike lavender as it looks like, flowers are pale lilac, stronger scent, 12 – 31 inches (30-80 cm) tall, blooming in between June and September.

They all look great. I can almost smell the refreshing aroma of lavender just by looking at the images!
The typical lavender scent is well recognized, but some don’t have such a distinctive scent as it can be faint.

Have some lavenders in your garden, whichever types you want, and just enjoy them!
It is highly recommended to plant a few of them in a row to delineate boundaries in your garden. Otherwise, free-style planting works just as well!