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Giant Vegetable Sheep

Haastia pulvinaris

Also called Vegetable Sheep

Giant Vegetable Sheep
Photo: Leon Perrie, CC BY 4.0

Giant vegetable sheep is a slow-growing alpine perennial from New Zealand's South Island that forms dense, woolly cushions resembling a flock of sheep. It is a cold-climate plant that is hard to keep in ordinary gardens.

Family
Asteraceae (Daisy family)
Grows as
Perennial
Light
Full sun
Water
Water sparingly, letting the mix dry out between waterings; avoid waterlogging, especially in winter.
Soil
Very free-draining gritty mix with extra grit or scree, similar to its rocky native slopes.
Temperature
5–15 °C in its natural cool habitat; tolerates frost but dislikes heat and humid warmth.
How easy
Hard
Native range
N. & NC. New Zealand South I.
Climate
subalpine or subarctic

About

Haastia pulvinaris, or vegetable sheep, is a species of perennial alpine plant that grows in a bizarre, sheep-like formation on scree slopes in the South Island of New Zealand.

It is not actually a sheep; but from far away, the vegetable sheep can look like a flock of them on the rocky slopes where they live.

Where it grows

Known only from the South Island. A species of Raoulia forms vegetable sheep on the North Island.

Other Haastia plants

Haastia sinclairii · Haastia

Text excerpted from the Wikipedia article Haastia pulvinaris by its contributors, under CC BY-SA 4.0; the excerpts and the care summary drawn from them are shared under the same licence.

The care summary was written by AI (Claude, Anthropic) from the sources on this page, with general growing knowledge where they are silent. Check before relying on it.

Life form, climate and native range: World Checklist of Vascular Plants, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (CC BY 3.0), reformatted; see Plants of the World Online.

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