Perennials are an easy way to add color to the garden, whether it's wet or dry, in sun or in shade.
By definition, a perennial is a plant that comes back for more than one year. In a perfect world, they come back forever, but weather can make that a challenge some years.
Some perennials bloom for a few weeks, while others can bloom for months.
The key to picking perennials is to choose plants that like the conditions you have in your yard. It's also smart to select a variety of plants that can give you color in various seasons.
Here are some great perennials for Arkansas gardens that add interest for a long period.
SHADE LOVERS
Hosta
The reigning king of shade perennials is the hosta, and there are hundreds of varieties. Hostas are grown primarily for their foliage, but some do have showy, fragrant white flowers.
The size of the mature plant varies tremendously, from teacup hostas -- miniatures -- which fit into the popular "fairy gardens" and stay quite small, up to the "Sum and Substance" type, which can easily be 5 feet across at maturity.
Foliage color can range from solid green to yellows, blues and variegated greens.
Note that deer love hosta, and so if you live where deer roam, another perennial might last longer for you. Slugs can also be a problem. One determined slug can make a small hosta vanish in the night. But if you mulch with sweetgum balls, they'll stay away.
Hostas love a rich site with ample moisture and regular fertilization. They do die back in the winter.
Coral bells
A great companion plant for hostas in the shade garden are heucheras or coral bells. These perennials are evergreen and, again, grown more for their foliage than their small flowers.
In recent years, an amazing number of new varieties have hit the market. From green-foliaged forms to yellow, purple, silver and orange and other colors, including variegations, there is a heuchera that will fit in any shade garden.
Not all of them love the heat and humidity of the South, so make sure H. villosa is in the parentage. Read the plant tag. These are long-lived plants: They did remarkably well here last winter.
• Foam flower
Also consider tiarella, commonly called foam flower, which is very similar to heuchera. Plant breeders have crossed these two plants, and we have a wide range of heucherellas to choose from as well. All are great choices for the shade garden.
Ferns
Many people still consider the Boston fern the ideal summer plant, but they are not winter-hardy. Once you take them indoors they require care during the winter. Why not choose hardy ferns, which thrive year-round outside and, if planted in the right spot, take care of themselves?
Some, including Christmas fern, holly fern and autumn fern, are evergreen, keeping their foliage year-round. There are more varieties that die back in the winter. Japanese painted fern is a variegated form and quite popular; and the cinnamon fern is large with showy foliage. Check out what varieties your local nursery carries.
These hardy ferns like a well amended, rich site with average moisture. They will continue to improve with age, and you don't have to take them inside and spend your winter vacuuming up disintegrating frond bits.
Solomon's seal
Solomon's seal (Polygonatum) are delightful and tough perennial plants for the shade garden. Solomon's seal will slowly form dense colonies of graceful, arching stems in light or deep shade. It produces small bell-shaped flowers that dangle beneath the stems.
The variegated form really brightens up a shady location and is beautiful all growing season. It is slow to establish but very drought-tolerant once it is. In the fall, dying leaves become a nice yellow.
A new dwarf form, "Tom Thumb," can work as a groundcover in shady areas.
Hellebores are reliable evergreen perennials for the shade that bear flowers in the winter to early spring. They have flowers in shades of pink, purple, red or white. (Despite names such as Christmas rose and Lenten rose, they are not related to roses.)
These plants are poisonous and so deter deer. Once established, they are quite drought tolerant. They are readily available at nurseries in late fall through early spring.
New varieties like "Cinnamon Snow" and "Pink Frost" have showy, upright blooms, instead of the drooping blooms of the older varieties.
SUN BATHERS
Amsonia
Amsonia is a tough native perennial with pretty blue flowers in the spring and nice yellow foliage in the fall. There are several varieties but the two most commonly sold are the Arkansas amsonia or bluestar (Amsonia hubrichtii) and the willow leaf amsonia (Amsonia tabernaemontana).
The willow leaf form tends to have showier flowers, but the Arkansas form has prettier fall color. Both types are long lived and low maintenance once established.
A new variety of willow leaf called "Blue Ice" has stunning dark blue flowers.
m Purple coneflower
Echinacea or purple coneflower is a tough native plant. With a little deadheading (cutting off the spent flowers), these plants bloom for months in full sun to partial shade.
Our native echinacea is a pinkish-purple flower, and I believe is still the best echinacea for Arkansas gardens; but there are many new echinaceas on the market in a wide array of colors -- yellow, orange, white, red and some double-flower forms.
Salvia
Salvia is another huge family of perennials with a lot of variety. Most thrive in well-drained sites with full sunlight. Available flower colors range from purples and blues to pinks, reds and whites.
Some salvias are small; others quite tall. Mature "Victoria Blue" is about a foot tall, but Mexican bush sage (Salvia leucantha) can be 5 feet tall or more. Mexican bush sage is spectacular in late summer with its long spikes of velvety purple blooms adored by bees and butterflies.
Sedums
Succulents are all the rage. These thick, fleshy-stemmed plants are drought tolerant and thrive in poor sites. One family with many choices are the sedums. There are a variety of ground-hugging forms including goldmoss sedum, "Angelina" with yellow green foliage, "John Creech" with small rosettes of green leaves, and sedum baby tears.
Succulents can blanket rocky ground with foliage.
Hibiscus
Hardy hibiscus likes sunny, moist locations. Unlike tropical hibiscus, which must come indoors in the winter, hardy hibiscus can stay outside. Although they do like warm weather, they form woody stalks that die back to the soil line after a hard freeze.
They normally bloom from June through August in Arkansas, producing dinner-plate-size flowers in shades of pink, red or white.
Mature plant height varies, but these aren't tiny plants: They range from 36 inches tall to 6 feet or more.
In the right location, these plants cover themselves with so many flowers they could stop traffic. New varieties include "Cherry Cheesecake," with pink and white blooms on a green foliaged plant, and "Summer Storm," with purple foliage and pink flowers.
Janet B. Carson is a horticulture specialist for the University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service.
HomeStyle on 05/17/2014