High Plains Gardening
The gardening website of the Texas High Plains Region
Mostly Sun
Able to withstand exposure to full sun most of the daylight hours with two hours or less of shade.
The vitex, or chaste tree is a small tree or a very large shrub, depending on water and climate, and is cold hardy to the Texas Panhandle. Low water-use once established, it can grow well in higher water zones. It is called the summer lilac because of the similarities of its flowers to the lilac shrub. Vitex varieties can be found in blue, lavender, and pink fragrant flowers. The leaves are similar to those of the marijuana plant. Vitex will sucker, especially when given ample water. It is native to southern Europe and Western Asia.
Desert never equates with drab. The flowers on Desert Bird of Paradise are simply stunning! Though classified as a Zone 7 plant, I’ve grown Desert Bird of Paradise for 3-4 years near a south facing wall and have seen several others around Amarillo, without it dying back it to roots. However, if it does, just prune out the dead wood. Eye catching flowers bloom continually from June into fall and attract hummingbirds. Finely divided green leaves. It is said to survive on 8” of rainfall, but monthly soakings enhance it. C. mexicana, Mexican Bird of Paradise and C.
I am unable to correctly identify the species of ‘Sapphire Blue’ sea holly. I have found references with it shown as a variety or hybrid cultivar of E. alpinum, E. maritimum, E. amethystinum and E. x planum. If you’re looking to order this plant, anyone of the species will produce a plant that looks similar to the picture. This sea holly is named more for its steel blue foliage, than for the color of the flower. Sea hollies make an excellent cut and dried flower and make a stunning architectural display in the garden.
Outstanding shrubby perennial fragrant herb for the garden! Very good soil drainage is the key to growing lavender, it does not like moist, compacted clay soil. Lavender appreciates supplemental irrigation every 2-4 weeks, if not provided naturally. Trim back in late winter or early spring by not more than a third, or just trim down last years flower stems. Triming too much off the plant will kill it.
Mock orange is one of those versatile old garden shrubs you can place almost anywhere; it will even flower in deep shade. Fragrant single pure white flowers in spring that may reoccur in the fall with a much lesser show. Drought tolerant once established. The versatility and fragrance must certainly be the reasons gardeners choose mock orange, it certainly isn’t for its irregular shape. I’m afraid I haven’t shown it much respect, allowing its mostly shady corner to be littered with gardener’s menagerie of plastic pots and unused brick-o-brack.
There are many different sedum species and varieties of this delightful spreading groundcover. I took this picture on a garden tour in Angel Fire New Mexico, and have not been able to identify it yet. It is easy to see from the picture how it got its common name, stonecrop. Sedum groundcovers spread nicely in a low to medium water use area of gritty, well drained soil, and will do just fine in afternoon shade.
Native evergreen shrub that makes an excellent hedge plant and wind break. Its blue-green prickly leaves keep the unwanted out (to a point). Please allow room for its spread.
A habitat plant for shelter and as a food source of food for birds and other wildlife that is an attractive addition to the home landscape, where an evergreen shrub is called for in a sunny spot. Sun yellow flowers in March. Cold hardy to -20°, algerita can be found growing from 4000 to 7000 ft. in elevation in Texas, the southwest and Mexico.
Desert globemallow is one of those native plants that keeps on giving, asking so little in return and is a worthy addition to any native or xeric garden. Typically, desert globemallow sports pretty pink flowers. though some plants will bloom white, coral or lavender. Whatever color, they are worth the addition to your sunny and dry landscape for their pleasant cheery nature. Similar to appearane to S. coccinea, a coral blooming species.
Big Bend silverleaf is the most cold hardy of the Leucophyllums and has wintered over in Amarillo, Zone 7, for 5 years so far. Possibly cold hardy to Zone 6. It is hard to beat a more attractive summer blooming shrub for small xeric spaces. After summer rainfalls, Big Bend silverleaf, native to the Big Bend National Park area, becomes covered in silver blue flowers that twinkle like jewels among its silvery gray leaves. Hard to find, it's worth searching for.
Cypress vine is a native annual tropical vine of the Americas, but has naturalized in Florida and the Gulf Coast areas; said to be cold hardy to Zone 6. Fine lacy or thread-like leaves twine as it grows, putting on scarlet red flowers in summer. In addition to being a climber, it can be used as a groundcover.
It is so refreshing to see the rain lilies bloom after a long hot summer. Whenever they begin to bloom, I know the worst heat is over. Rain lilies are a delightful flower that sends up glossy green, grass-like leaves from its bulb in late spring. In mid to late summer, pure white flowers resembling a crocus open and continue through September, usually after a good summer rainfall. There are quite a few species and varieties (of various colors) of Zephrantes, however, Z. candida is the only rain lily cold hardy in Amarillo. I've grown it successfully since 2008.
Cliff fendlerbush is another Texas and Southwest native shrub too little used in the xeric landscape. Springtime lifts the cliff fendlerbush above the ordinary into prominence in the landscape. It is said the ravines and arroyos look dotted with snow from a distance, so profuse are the fragrant, creamy white, sometimes with a pink tinge, four petaled flowers in May and June. It's natural element is rocky arroyos (rupicola=rock dweller), cliff ledges and limestone soils with good drainage that average 12-18 inches of moisture with hot sunny days.
Bush morning glory is a non-vining herbaceous perennial with a deep taproot, allowing it to be drought tolerant, but difficult to transplant. Arching branches with narrow upright green leaves emerge from the taproot. Summer blooming with 3 inch pink to purple funnel shaped flowers that open in the morning and close in the afternoon. Bush morning glory typically inhabits sandy and sandy loan plains, meadows, prairies and roadsides.
Karl Foerster feather reed grass is a cool season bunch grass one of the best ornamental grasses for a medium or high water-use area. In a low water-use area, it will take longer to reach mature height and width (the more water it gets, the bigger it'll get). Karl Foerster feather reed grass suffers in the xeric bed during the hotter, drier drought years and may die out.
Sometimes referred to as Gaillardia x grandiflora ‘Burgundy’. A cross between G. aristata and G. puchella. I’ve not been able to determine whether these are 2 different varieties, or just name confusion. They must be quite similar, nonetheless. It reseeded once for me, so I'm not sure at all. Medium water for this plant through the heat of summer will prolong blooms, as will afternoon shade. A stunning plant and prolific bloomer for your border.
Linum lewisii, the southwestern and western native perennial wildflower variety of flax was named after Meriwether Lewis, who was first to describe it during the Lewis and Clark Expedition. On July 18th, 1805, near the Great Falls of the Missouri Lewis recorded: "I have observed for several days a species of the flax growing in the river bottoms the leaf stem and pericarp of which resembles the common flax cultivated in the U'States. The stem rises to the hight of about 2 1/2 or 3 feet high; as many as 8 or ten of which proceeds from the same root.
Another old garden perennial that’s still good for our Panhandle cottage gardens, Physotegia virginiana is native to eastern and southeastern US. A terrific addition to the late summer and fall garden. Comes in three pleasing colors of light pink, purplish pink and a real pretty white. The white variety "Miss Manners' and 'Summer Snow' are both better mannered, not spreading quite as vigorously. It's native habitat is in moist, rich soils, but keeping it on the lean side makes it more "obedient".
The Crassulaceae family of plants fascinates me, and the sedums are one of its larger genera. I first saw ‘Frosty Morn” featured on a gardening program from Iowa, so I wondered whether it’d be drought tolerant. Shortly afterwards, I found it at our local nursery and planted in my xeristrip. It has never faltered. The only disfiguring occurrence is a little nipping by grasshoppers during early summer, which has never seemed to harm it, or other large leafed sedums.
Wagons Ho! Rugged, ragged and windblown -- a true picture of the western and southwestern landscape. If you have a skeleton of a steer's head, now is the time to use it, along with that wagon wheel. Sometimes referred to as the western sage.
Big sagebrush is a coarse, many-branched, aromatic, pale-grey shrub with yellow flowers and light silvery-grey foliage. It flowers in late summer to early fall. The leaves are wedge-shaped with three lobes.
Dasylirion is one of the plants I call a southwest evergreen. Different in appearance from traditional evergreen shrubs, it fulfills the same purpose in native and xeric landscapes. Symmetrical rosette of narrow leaf blades or leaves emanating from the center of the rosette. Barbs lining the margins of the thick pale green leaves give Dasylirion another common name, sawtooth yucca. As Sotol ages, a trunk may form under the rosette and even multiple heads may develop. At maturity, an 8-10 foot tall flower spike ascends from the center where thousands of small creamy white flowers open.
Agaves are striking and architectural Southwest native plants and are included in a group of plants I term Southwest evergreens. They are unusual in that at maturity, they only flower once, and then die. for this reason, some classify them as multiannual, rather than perennial. However, as they common name suggests, it takes many years before they flower. Leaves of the Agave are arranged in a spiral beginning from a near invisible stem, forming a rosette.Agaves vary in size from 4-6 inches to larger than man-size.
Lantana urticoides (horrida) is a native perennial, and cold hardy for most of the state, except for areas in the Texas Panhandle. In the Panhandle, several species of Lantana are sold as summer bedding plants. Blooms prolifically summer and fall. Colors normally available are red, red and yellow, yellow, white and purple or mauve. In rare cases they may winter over. In areas south, lantana will grow into a shrub. The blue/black fruit clusters are poisonous.
Attracts butterflies.
White flowering zinnia is native to the Southwest and Northern Mexico. A low mounding plant, it becomes completely covered with small white flowers with a central yellow disk, similar to our native prairie zinnia, Zinnia grandiflora. Blooms from June through fall. Desert zinnia is toxic if ingested by humans.
New Mexican privet can be viewed either as a tall shrub or smaller tree. New Mexican privet will flower (tiny yellow) before leafing out with small oval glossy green leaves to be followed with black berries in the fall. Heat and drought tolerant will live in most soils and water-use areas. Attractive taller plant for the home landscape, similar to the yaupon holly in form.
Gayfeather is one of the High Plains jewels of autumn, sending up grasslike leaves or stalks that bloom gloriously in September and October to fuzzy purple spikes. At maturity, one plant can grow a dozen or more, size and number depending on rainfall amounts. Drier years, the stalks are few and short, but with monthly or twice a month watering, the plant displays much more vitality. The purple flowers contrast nicely with the many yellow flowers that bloom on the plains. Liatris punctata is the most drought tolerant of the genus.
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