Echinops hussonii Seeds | Husson’s Globe Thistle

Steel-blue globe flower heads on a stiff grey-green thistle stem — Husson’s Globe Thistle (*Echinops hussonii*): Asteraceae, dry steppe of western and central Asia.

LATIN NAME: Echinops hussonii

COMMON NAME: Husson’s Globe Thistle

Plant Profile

Husson’s globe thistle is a steppe plant with a flower head that looks engineered, and in a sense it is, because the ball is made of many florets. The blue globe is not a single flower but a compound head of many tiny one-flowered capitula packed into a sphere, each with its own little tube and its long protruding stamens, which is why the whole ball appears to shimmer with points of blue. The plant grows about a metre tall, with deeply cut, prickly, grey-green leaves and a stiff, upright stem that rarely needs staking. It flowers in midsummer and the heads hold their colour for weeks, drying to a papery blue that lasts through winter. It comes from the dry steppe of western and central Asia, on open, sunny, often stony ground, and it is one of the hardest of the globe thistles, tolerant of drought and of poor, alkaline soil.

Science & Biotechnology

Echinops hussonii is in the Cardueae, the thistle tribe of the daisy family, and the globe is a pseudanthium: a dense secondary head of many capitula, each containing a single floret. That architecture is why the head is so efficient at presenting pollen and nectar to a wide range of bees, and why a single globe can be visited by dozens of insects at once. The spiny leaves are a defence against grazing, and the grey colour comes from a dense covering of hairs that reflects light and reduces water loss. The genus is known for its alkaloids, notably echinopsine, which has been studied for pharmacological activity, though the plant is not used medicinally in any serious way. Seed is an achene with a pappus of scales, dispersed by wind, and it germinates readily on disturbed ground.

Uses & Benefits

It is a garden plant for dry, sunny, poor ground: the middle or back of a border, a gravel garden, a steppe planting, or a wildflower meadow on thin soil. The heads are excellent cut and dried, holding their colour for months, and they are a standard ingredient in dried arrangements. For pollinators it is first-rate, since the globes are open at a time when many border plants are between flushes, and the plant is drought-tolerant enough to keep flowering without irrigation. It has no culinary use. The roots and seed have a minor folk record in central Asia as a bitter tonic, but the pharmacology is thin and the plant is best treated as an ornamental. It is also deer-resistant, which is not nothing.

Growing from Seed

Sow in late winter or early spring on the surface of a gritty, low-fertility mix, and press the seed in without covering it, since it needs light. Cold stratification for four weeks improves germination, which takes two to four weeks at 18 to 22 degrees. Keep the seedlings in full sun and on the dry side, and prick them out as soon as they can be handled, because they resent root disturbance later. Pot on into a gritty mix, and plant out in autumn or early spring, in full sun and well-drained, preferably alkaline soil. Do not enrich the ground, which produces tall, weak stems. Water only in the first summer. Leave the heads standing for winter structure, and cut the whole plant to the ground in early spring before the new growth starts.

Our Take

A tough, drought-proof thistle for poor sunny ground, with blue globes that hold their colour for months. Give it grit, no fertiliser and plenty of sun.

Herb Seeds