So about my garden style. It could be construed as slightly schizophrenic. I’ve analyzed the plants I’ve chosen and here are the major categories I see: Asian, tropicalesque, desert/rock garden/xeriscape, big drama, chartreuse foliage, blackish-burgundy foliage, blue foliage, plants with great architecture, amazing fall color, plants for birds/bees/butterflies and conifers.

How the heck am I going to make it all make sense, since you can see almost our entire garden from one spot — at least until it’s established? Ornamental grasses. They’re a no-brainer. There are shade varieties, sun varieties, damp and dry varieties. Some have plumes, some have panicles. Some upright, some blousey. They come in all sizes and colors. Are pretty low maintenance. And best of all: they blow in the breeze.

Here are the grasses I have going in the ground, in no particular order — 21 flavors so far:

Fargesia sp. ‘Rufa’ (cold-hardy Clumping Bamboo)…

Sasa veitchii ‘Kuma Zasa’ (Kuma Bamboo)…

Hakonechloa macra ‘Aureola’ (Japanese Forest Grass)…

Hakonechloa macra ‘All Gold’ (Japanese Forest Grass)…

Hakonechloa macra ‘Beni Kaze’ (Japanese Forest Grass)…

Chasmanthium latifolium (Northern Sea Oats)…

Carex appalachica (Appalachian Sedge)…

Carex flacca ‘Blue Zinger’ (Blue Zinger Sedge)…

Helictotrichon sempervirens ‘Saphirsprudel’ (Blue Sapphire Fountain Grass)…

Miscanthus sinensus ‘Rotsilber’ (Red-Silver Japanese Silver Grass)…

Schizachyrium scoparium ‘The Blues’ (Little Bluestem)…

Panicum virgatum ‘Shenandoah’ (Shenadoah Switch Grass)…

Panicum virgatum ‘Heavy Metal’ (Blue Switch Grass)…

Panicum virgatum ‘Dallas Blues’ (Dallas Blue Switch Grass)…

Panicum virgatum ‘Ruby Ribbons’ (Ribbons Switch Grass)…

Miscanthus sinensis v. purpurascens (Flame Grass)…

Calamagrostis x acutiflora ‘Avalanche’ (Variegated Feather Reed Grass)…

Elymus arenarius ‘Blue Dune’ (Blue Lyme Grass)…

Pennisetum alopecuroides ‘Hameln’ (Dwarf Fountain Grass)…

Festuca glauca ‘Elijah Blue’ (Blue Fescue)…

Stipa Gigantea (Giant Feather Grass)…

Every one of the ornamental grasses above, whether I’ve had it waiting in a pot or bought it new to fill out the garden, are perennial. At least here in Zone 5.

The great part about grass is how easy it is to make MORE OF IT. Take Japanese Forest Grass  — late last summer I sliced my single clump in half. When spring came, I had two large clumps. I sliced those two into fourths and those eight clumps are already big! Btw, just saw that same forest grass at a local nursery for $25 a container. Talk about easy math.

Will share more plants in other categories in the days ahead. You can hardly wait, right? Right?

Tags: garden, plants

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 9th, 2010 at 10:13 pm and is filed under garden, plants. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.