The lavender you saw might be willow verbena

Summer is the season of lavender, but it is also the flowering period of various flowers that look like lavender, such as willow verbena.
Of course, if you also like these purple flowers, not just lavender, it is also a good choice.
Let's first look at the serious lavender (scientific name: Lavandula angustifolia), which is a small shrub of the Lamiaceae, lavender genus, the stem is erect, star-shaped hairs, old branches gray-brown, with strips of peeling cortex, leaves or Lanceolate strips.
Lavender was born in France and in the southern foothills of the Alps along the Mediterranean coast in southern Italy, as well as in Spain and North Africa. In the 13 century, it was the main plant in the garden of European medical monasteries. In the 15 century, cultivation began in the Haierxian region; at the end of the century, cultivation began in southern France; {{3 }} In the century, Surrey ’s Mitchell, London ’s Lavender in the South, Provence in France, and the mountains near Grasse all became tourist destinations by planting lavender.
China has a large area of ​​cultivation in Xinjiang, and the Ili Kazakh Autonomous Prefecture in the Tianshan Mountains is the main base for the cultivation and processing of lavender in China and a large spice production base in Asia.
Therefore, to identify lavender can grasp the following points:
　　1. It is of the Lamiaceae family, the inflorescence is spike-shaped, and each of its small flowers is divided into upper and lower parts (like a lip)
　　2. It is a small shrub, and the part close to the surface is basically woody.
　　3. Its fragrance, scent of lavender has a characteristic that will not be forgotten as long as you smell it once.
Mastering these, you can basically tell the real lavender. There are basically two basic hypotheses in our country that are lavender: one is willow verbena (scientific name: Verbena bonariensis L.) and the other is sage (scientific name: Salvia japonica Thunb.).
Sage is like a lavender, so it looks like it, but they have a big difference. There is a small spot on the petals of sage ~ this is not in lavender. Not fragrant, this is also a good distinction
The other is the willow verbena, a plant of the verbena family of the verbena family. Its inflorescence is umbrella-shaped, not at all like the lavender spike. Lavender is blue-purple. Knock on the blackboard! It's not fragrant!
Well, so mastering the above small methods, you can also easily distinguish which ones are really lavender.