Grasses for Autumn Interest.
30/10/2007Grasses are not only beautiful but are easy maintenance and give a very long season of interest. Many are lending stunning autumn colours to the garden at the moment, such as Miscanthus 'Malepartus'. See photo full size in the Gallery for more detail.
There are cold season grasses and warm season grasses, the Miscanthus are in the latter group and do not start into vigorous growth until summer warms up, but then ,of course they are in their prime later in the year when the earlier grasses are faded beauties.I use a selection of each group to give a very long season of interest. Stipa Gigantea produces strong flower spikes in May, with shimmering bronze flowers in June, fading to a straw colour through the summer and are still lovely now, particularly when back lit by low sunlight.
Some grasses look good all year, such as Chionochloa rubra from New Zealand. Given space It develops into a 3ft airy dome of fine wiry, auburn leaves, turning a rich copper in cold weather and also stunning in sunlight . The flowers are insignificant.
I could not imagine being without grasses to add interest and structure to the planting throughout the year and strongly recommend them.
