Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Ornamental grasses

Ornamental grasses - if I had to choose a favorite group of plants in my garden, they would be at the top of my list.. Few plants are as versatile, carefree and dynamic as grasses.And yes, they do flower in subtle ways that grasses do - and they make wonderful companion plants for flowering perennials. Grasses contribute a contemporary design edge that will jazz up almost any garden. They really deliver on low maintenance and high style.
Perhaps the biggest misconception about grasses is that they are all invasive and will take over your garden.In fact, most grasses sold for home garden and landscape purposes are well-behaved clumping types that won't misbehave.


Grasses are magical because they're never static. They emerge lush green early in the season, and by summer they've filled out and begin to plume or flower. Through the season, they move with the slightest breeze and sound wonderful when the wind rustles through them.
In the fall, you get the later warm season grasses pluming and then changes of color to wheat, gold, flaming orange or copper. 

Ornamental grasses for North American gardens

Essentially a pond-in-a-pot is a large watertight pot with submerged or floating water plants arranged to create a pleasing composition.
For a container water garden, it's best to start out with a water-tight pot, intended for water gardening. I chose a glazed pot traditionally used to grow lotus plants (shown here).
However, any large watertight container at least 18 inches high with a diameter of at least 24 inches will do.Half barrels are a great size, and many garden centers now sell them with plastic liners as easy-to-set up kits.If you're going to set it up on a deck, balcony or roof-top, remember that a container water garden is heavy, so check that the structure is strong enough to support the weight. 

Aquatic plants for your easy water garden

Aquatic plants for your water garden will need a platform on which to sit. I used a large upside-down plastic nursery container and weighed it down with bricks.
Another method is to stack bricks up from the bottom of the container, but this will make your pot heavier.Once you have your shelf ready, you just fill the container with water and arrange a collection of water plants into a pleasing composition

Add a pump for the soothing sound of water

If you crave the sound of water in the garden, you can install a small re-circulating fountain pump at the bottom of the container with a short length of plastic hose attached to act as a small fountain.A pump isn't absolutely necessary in a container water garden, but it does prevent the water from going stagnant and breeding mosquitoes.I put my pump inside the upside-down plastic pot, and thread the plastic hosing (which takes the water up to the surface) through the drainage hole in the pot.With this style of water garden, the pump's electrical cord will be visible at the back of the container, but it's easy to camouflage with cleverly placed plants and foliage - just like I did with my container water garden in the picture shown above.If you don't have a pump, add a gold fish or two; they're voracious consumers of mosquito larvae. If fish are not for you, mosquito larvae are effectively controlled organically with BTi mosquito dunks.

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