Summer is the season when grasses really perform, providing motion, sound and a haze of colour in your gardens. It is when they really take on their true forms and characters.
I feel that we really don’t give enough attention to having movement in the garden, but it does add a different element to any garden. Most of our gardens are filled with heavy evergreens like pyramid Junipers or dense Spruce that can add certain qualities such as colour and form, but they lack movement.
What can be more relaxing on a warm summer day then chilling out on your favourite lounge chair or hammock and watching the grasses sway and rustle in the breeze?
It is not just summer interest that grasses provide, but also can continue to show off throughout fall and winter as well. Left untrimmed until the spring, they will stand up beautifully all winter, showing off their silhouettes against the snow.
Grasses come in all sizes, shapes, textures and colours, from soft mounds, straight spikes, feathery fronds or arching cascades. Most grasses will fall under one of two categories: clumping or spreading forms.
Clump-forming grasses maintain their compact shape, so they’re well-behaved in flowerbeds. Spreading varieties can be invasive (some even pose a threat to native species in the wild), so they should be carefully chosen and controlled with care. I would strongly suggest that that you keep with clumping varieties.
When designing with grasses, planting them in groupings makes the biggest impact. Of course, this will depend on the size of your garden and overall space. The larger the area, the larger the grouping.
Ornamental grasses can blend in well with the different styles of gardens. Planted in masses in a linear pattern, will give you a more contemporary look. When planted in staggered groupings can give you a more traditional look. Planted in loose drifts is reminiscent of the countryside. In xeriscapes, sparse plantings of grasses surrounded with stone mulch gives you a totally different look.
Most grasses prefer a site that receives a minimum of five to six hours of sunlight. They prefer a well-drained sandy loam soil. Some of the grasses that prefer a part shade location are Hakonechloa (Japanese forest grass), Chasmanthium latifolium (northern sea oats), and Ophiopogon migrescens (black mondo grass).
When planting ornamental grasses, dig a larger hole at least two to three wider than the root ball. Once you have the root ball out of the pot, tease apart the roots especially if they are circling around the outside of the root ball. Pots of grasses can become quickly root-bound and teasing out the roots will allow the roots to take in the surrounding soil more quickly.
Then, place the root ball into the hole with the crown of the plant just above ground level. Water generously until it becomes well established.
Maintaining ornamental grasses is fairly easy, the toughest job is dividing the clumps every five to six years. When a clump gets too large or the centre of the clump begins to die back, wait until spring, then dig it up, leaving lots of soil around the edges. Using a pair of garden forks, pry apart the root ball and immediately replant the divisions back into amended soil.
The yearly maintenance includes cutting back the dried stalks every spring before new growth emerges. For shorter grasses, cut back to about two inches from the ground. For taller clumps, such as miscanthus, cut back to about 10 to 12 inches above ground. Grasses can also be cut back in the fall, but then you lose out on the winter interest.
Three of my favourite grasses to use in designs are: golden variegated Japanese forest grass (Hakonechloa macra “Aureola”), standing ovation little bluestem grass (Schizachyrium scoparium “Standing Ovation”), and morning light miscanthus (Miscanthus sinensis “Morning Light”).
Joanne Young is a Niagara-on-the-Lake Garden Expert and Coach. See her website at joanneyoung.ca
