Echium wildpretii Pearson ex Hook. fil. This woody-stemmed perennial is a slightly smaller monocarpic species, forming in the first years a beautiful rosette of silver leaves and then an elongated stem bearing small, deep red flowers. It grows on La Palma and on the high volcanic slopes of Mount Teide in Tenerife; at night it is chilled and caked with frozen fog; in the day it is baked by the hot sun. Thus this is a good plant for a high-altitude desert climate.
Cultivation Grow in poor rocky soil. Keep the rosettes dry in winter; they survive with little rainfall, even in spring.
Height to 4m (13ft); spread to 60cm (2ft). USZ 9–11, surviving -6.5°C (20°F) of overnight frost. Tolerant of summer drought.