Sometimes I think of leadplant (Amorpha canescens) as the ugly duckling of xeric shrubs. It’s just not appreciated. Consider this quote from the Missouri Botanic Gardens (MBG) webpage:
A somewhat ordinary looking, small shrub with an attractive bloom but otherwise with no particularly outstanding landscape features. Good plant for naturalizing in a native or wildflower garden, prairie or meadow.
In a field crowded with contenders, I have a new favorite wildflower. This plant is incredible—large, flashy, tough, gorgeous. What more could you want? Best of all, it’s thriving in my yard. I’m in love.
Most four o’clocks are sedate, old-fashioned garden flowers, something you’d see surrounding a cottage, combined with hollyhocks, old roses, and other grandmotherly plants. The Desert Four O’clock (Mirabilis multiflora) is like the grandma who dies her hair brilliant pink, wears short skirts with black fishnet stockings, and rides a Harley.
The storm pounded our garden, flattening flowers and washing away gravel. Even with the damage, I was grateful for the water—we spent over $100 last month just irrigating our xeric landscaping. Water is expensive, but rain is free. If only there was some way to save the downpour flooding our garden. But wait—there is! We could install a rain barrel!
You’ve read the instructions; I’ve used them frequently here in my posts. “Drought resistant once established.” Sounds good—we’re always trying to save water—but how should you water these plants to start with? And what does “established” mean?
There are a lot of misconceptions about xeric plants. Our landscaper (who was much better at dealing with hardscapes than with living plants) thought that our xeric shrubs and trees needed to be sopping wet for the first few years, until they were “established.” Dead, more likely. (I’m already having to replace some fernbushes that were growing in muck, and we lost the top half of our oak tree in the first few months.)
In the year we’ve lived in our new house, the first on the block, we’ve gained a number of neighbors. Now that the growing season is officially underway, these new yards are being landscaped. And I’m reminded all over again of why, back in 2000, I signed up to become a master gardener.
You see, when we first moved here, I quickly noticed that the major landscaping theme was composed of lawns, junipers, and rocks. Lots of rocks. I became a master gardener volunteer to help people grow more attractive and interesting landscapes. But in spite of all that advice, apparently nothing has changed in the last 23 years.
From a distance, a blooming fernbush (Chamaebatiaria millefolium) resembles a lovely white lilac bush, but no lilac would be in bloom at this time of year. Growing to seven feet high and wide, these shapely shrubs are covered in upright sprays of showy white flowers from June through August. Individual blossoms are reminiscent of single roses, and attract bees and butterflies. Come autumn, the flowers are replaced by russet seed heads.
A closer inspection reveals reddish peeling bark and the aromatic, finely dissected leaves that give Fernbush its common name. Even in our cold climate, these leaves stay on the bush for most of the year; branches are bare for a mere three to four months each winter. Fall foliage is an attractive copper color.
I really don’t like junipers, but it’s not their fault. Rather, I blame the landscapers.
Think of the countless homeowners who plant Pfitzer junipers (Juniperus chinensis ‘Pfitzeraiana’) in front of their living room windows, then shear them to a fraction of their normal size. That’s not fair to the plant, it’s unattractive, and it makes a lot of work for the gardener.
Similarly, junipers are planted along sidewalks and in parking lots (where they tenaciously hang on despite compacting foot traffic and scorching summer heat). Quickly outgrowing the space allotted, they’re pruned at the edge of the pavement, resulting in a wall of dead, brown branches.
Finally, manzanitas for Colorado gardeners! When we first moved to Colorado, back in 1993, I wanted to add some manzanitas to our ponderosa forest landscape, but the cultivars available weren’t deemed hardy enough for our 7000 foot elevation. I gave up and settled for Mahonia—not at all the same thing, but about the only broad-leafed evergreen I could get to grow in my yard.
When it comes planting a spring flowering tree, most Colorado gardeners immediately think of crabapples. Wildly popular all along the Front Range, crabs deserve their stellar reputation. However, they aren’t the only flowering tree that thrive in our harsh environment. There might even be a better choice! Consider their close relative, the Hawthorn.
With intense sulfur-yellow flowers covering its gray-green foliage, blooming Rabbitbrush demands to be noticed. In fact, the prairies of eastern Colorado are almost blanketed with it—something we never notice until it blooms. Interspersed with prickly cholla cactus and some perennial range grasses, it forms the essence of western landscapes. But it’s not just for the wide open spaces. Rabbitbrush is an excellent performer in the garden as well.
Mountain Plover 