A specimen of Salvia sclarea L. is known from from Suttons Bay, Leelanau Co. (no collector or date, but ca. 1910). It is commonly cultivated, and this may well have been from a cultivated plant; in any event, it has not been gathered since. It is easily distinguished from all our species by the conspicuous, brightly colored pinkish bracts in the inflorescence. 

1. Flowers yellow (with some purple dotting).

S. koyamae

1. Flowers blue (very rarely white).

2. Calyx 3-lobed (i.e., the upper lip entire, the lower 2-lobed); leaf blades linear-lanceolate, tapered at base, glabrous or minutely pubescent.

3. Flowers mostly 6 or more at each node, ca. 1.2-2 cm long; calyx pubescent throughout, distinctly shorter than the corolla tube.

S. azurea

3. Flowers mostly 2 (rarely 4) at each node of the inflorescence, at most 1 cm long; calyx minutely pubescent on the nerves, about equaling or exceeding the corolla tube.

S. reflexa

2. Calyx 5-lobed (upper lip 3-toothed); leaf blades various.

4. Leaf blades all tapering to petioles, ± narrowly elliptic; upper lip of corolla straight; shrubby, at least at the base of the plant.

S. officinalis

4. Leaf blades, at least the lower ones, truncate to cordate at base, ± ovate; upper lip of corolla strongly arched; herbaceous.

S. pratensis