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Cushion Bugloss, or Cretan Bugloss. Dwarf and compact perennial of the Boraginaceae family, endemic to the mountains of Crete, where it grows exclusively in limestone screes, rock crevices, and high-altitude rockeries, mainly in the Lefka Ori (White Mountains) and Psiloritis massifs, between 1,500 and 2,400 meters altitude. This extremely restricted range and highly specialized ecological requirements make it a rare, precious plant sought after by alpine plant collectors.
At first glance, it hardly resembles its large cousin Anchusa azurea : where the latter develops an imposing and expansive stature, Anchusa caespitosa forms small, dense, and tight rosettes, strictly applied against the rocky substrate, not exceeding 5 to 10 centimeters in height. The leaves are narrowly lanceolate, very elongated compared to their width, leathery, covered with stiff whitish hairs that give them a hispid texture characteristic of Boraginaceae, and a matte grayish-green. These rosettes interlock and multiply slowly to form compact, dense cushion clumps, well anchored in rock crevices by a deep, taproot system adapted to seeking moisture deep in a draining mineral substrate.
The flowering is strikingly beautiful and totally disproportionate to the size of the plant: large flowers — large relative to the whole plant — in a flared funnel shape with five rounded lobes, of intense blue to deep violet-blue, adorned with a central white eye formed by the typical ring of scales of the genus, emerge directly from the heart of the rosettes on very short stems, to the point of seeming to rest directly on the foliage. The effect is that of a gray-green cushion studded with small intense blue stars, of great elegance. Flowering occurs in May-June in cultivation conditions, or later at altitude in its natural habitat.
In cultivation, it represents an honorable challenge for the gardener specialized in alpine plants. It requires absolutely perfect drainage, a very mineral and limestone substrate, full sun exposure, and protection against stagnant winter moisture which is fatal to it. It is ideally cultivated in a pot in a mix of crushed limestone, gravel, and a small proportion of clay soil, placed in a cold greenhouse or under a frame for winter to protect it not from the cold — it is hardy — but from excess moisture. In open ground, it finds its place in a very well-drained rockery, ideally on a slope, or in the crevices of a south-facing limestone wall. Propagation is done by sowing in autumn, exposed to cold to break dormancy, or by cuttings of individual rosettes carefully taken in spring.
It is held in high esteem in British alpine cultivation circles in particular, where it has been awarded by the Royal Horticultural Society, and regularly features in specialized rock plant exhibitions as one of the most remarkable buglosses of the genus for the combination of its miniature habit and the intensity of its blue flowering.