Perennial Borders: Easy Way To Add Character To Landscape
A perennial border can enhance almost any landscape. If you recently moved into a newly constructed home, or if you have lived for a while with a yard that looks like it’s lacking in character, perennial borders could be the perfect – and fairly simple – answer.
A perennial border can literally form a border around all or part of your yard, creating a colorful backdrop to your lawn and forming a natural separation between your property and your neighbor’s.
As always, place the lowest-growing plants towards the front of the border with taller plants towards the back. A border does not have to be a straight line! A curved edge adds interest and allows you to get creative with the size and shape of the plants in your border.
Another idea: place perennial borders along both sides of a garden pathway. Choose low-growing perennials that define the edge of the path and consider including some ornamental grasses.
Here are a couple of perennials that could be ideal choices for your border planting.
Anemone Whirlwind
Cheryl and I enjoy the creative names that horticulturists give to new cultivars they work on! These anemones, called Whirlwind, seem to have been named for the graceful way they bow and sway with every swirl of breeze.
They are the result of crossing three different species, all of which originated in China, but get the incorrect description of Japanese, due to an early record that erroneously indicated that a plant came from Japan. Too late to change it now, I guess!
Anemone Whirlwinds are ideal border plants. One reason we like them is that they rise fairly late in the spring so they cover and replace the dying foliage of early spring bulbs. They come into their own in late summer and early fall with pure white, semi-double flowers measuring about four inches across, atop stems that extend up two to three feet high above clumps of shorter basal foliage. The beautiful satiny flowers have greenish-yellow centers and make attractive cut flower arrangements.
Over a couple of seasons, anemone Whirlwinds can spread by rhizomes to about three or four feet wide. They are hardy to about 15 degrees F, giving you a nice display right into fall, and are best suited to USDA zones 5 to 8. You can cut them back to the ground in early winter or after the foliage has become frost-blackened.
Gallardia Arizona Sun
Here’s another aptly-named perennial border plant. When in full bloom, the flowers resemble a blazing sun seen from the desert in a Western movie. The centers are strawberry-red with dozens of petals radiating out from the center, the color transitioning from deep red through orange to a vibrant golden yellow at the tips. They are known as “blanket” plants because the blooms seem to blanket the entire plant at the height of the season.
Gallardia Arizona Sun is as close to a “care free” border plant as you can get. Simply deadhead spent blooms and they’ll keep coming back from mid-summer to fall.
Gaillardia grows best in well-drained fertile soil and once established requires little water making it an excellent Xeric garden plant. The Arizona Sun Gaillardia will tolerate sandy soils and is at its showy best in full sun, reaching a height of 8 to 10 inches. Gaillardias attract butterflies and are fairly resistant to deer and rabbit. Perfect in zones 3 through 9.
Gallardia Burgundy
Here’s an idea: along with your Arizona Suns, mix in some Gallardia Burgundy. Plant them a little further back in the border, as they can top out at about two feet tall.
Not surprisingly, this variety produces a blanket of burgundy wine-red blooms, each of which is about 3 inches across. Like the Arizona Sun, Burgundy prefers well-drained, sandy soil and full sun in zones 3 to 9.
Another good choice: the Dianthus Zing Rose, an ideal border plant I described in the previous column. If you missed that column you can find it at my Web site www.landsteward.org
The Plant Man is here to help. Send your questions about trees, shrubs and landscaping to steve@landsteward.org and for resources and additional information, or to subscribe to Steve’s free e-mailed newsletter, visit www.landsteward.org
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