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When choosing plants for your garden, don’t overlook Texas’ native grasses. Not only are they ecologically important, they can also provide texture and stunning fall color to your garden. You can find the following grasses at our spring plant sale on March 26, 2022.
Silver Bluestem – Bothriochloa laguroides
Clumping grass with silky flower puffs on vertical stems. Foliage of this plant is 12 to 18 inches high and the erect flower spike grows 2-3 feet above the foliage. As fall progresses, the leaves turn from red to purple or burnt orange. This color is held deep into winter. This plant can be used as an accent or in a prairie or meadow. Plant in well drained soil in full sun. Can take some shade but will flop over in too much shade. This plant is drought tolerant but can take some water.
Little Bluestem – Schizachryum scoparium
An ornamental bunchgrass with fine-textured foliage that forms very dense mounds 18 to 24 inches tall. Slender blue-green stems reach 3 feet by September, and become radiant mahogany-red with white, shining seed tufts in the fall. Color remains nearly all winter. Perennial clumps grow up to a foot in diameter.
Virginia Wildrye – Elymus virginicus
This grass prefers full sun to light shade, moist conditions, and a fertile soil containing loam or clay-loam. Plants that grow in sunlight tend to be more robust and a lighter shade of green than those that grow in shade. This grass is easy to cultivate if it receives enough moisture. Larval host to most branded skippers and satyrs, attracts birds and animal grazing.
Inland Sea Oats – Chasmanthium latifolium
A low maintenance, 2 feet tall shade-part shade grass. It likes moist soil and can tolerate periodic inundation. It reseeds freely and can cover an area in several years . It is bright green in spring, producing bright green seed heads, which turn brown in the fall/winter. Shear back to basal rosette in early spring. Birds eat ripe seeds and stems and leaves are used for nesting material.
Brownseed Paspalum – Paspalum plicatulum
This perennial grass has thick stems which can exceed 3 ft in height. The leaf blades are up to 14 in long. The inflorescence is a panicle with up to 7 branches. This grass grows in disturbed areas as well as prairies and forests. The seeds provide food for birds.
Fringed Windmill Grass – Chloris ciliata
This warm-season grass grows between 6 and 18 inches tall. The flower heads are 3 to 7 inches across and start out reddish but mature to a beige or brown color. The plant is dormant in winter. Dried stems provide important forage for birds and other animals in winter. Requires full to partial sun. Propagation is by division. Good for erosion control.
Gulf Muhly – Muhlenbergia capillaris
Gulf muhly is a perennial grass that grows 1.5 to 3 feet tall. The grass has a large, airy, much-branched seed head that is up to half as long as the entire plant. The spikelets are purple. In fall the plant takes on a feathery, deep pink hue, creating a stunning pink to lavender floral display.
Knotroot Bristlegrass – Setaria parviflora
A native perennial bunchgrass , which grows in full sun or partial shade, 2 to 3 feet in height, blooming most of the year. It prefers moist, clay areas but tolerates periods of dryness. With good conditions it may reseed vigorously. May provide seeds for birds.
To learn more about our spring plant sale, see our Native Plant Sale post.
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**ARCHIVED POST AUTHOR: debbiebush
