HOW IRONIC that one of the most exuberantly floriferous plants in our gardens is Vitex agnus-castus—the chaste tree. There’s nothing chaste about its libidinous explosion of eight-to-ten-inch lilac to lavender panicles at almost every branch tip from June to October.
It blooms so enthusiastically and enticingly that it attracts every pollinator in the vicinity, including hummingbirds, butterflies and honey bees (vitex makes superb honey).
In antiquity and through the Middle Ages, the young shoots of vitex were used to make baskets, but also its small purplish fruits were used to regulate women’s reproductive health and regularity and to decrease the libido in both women
