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Miscanthus Bandwidth™ Will Bandwidth™ magically endow the border with wifi? Probably not, but the broad bands of gold on its stiff, upright blades guarantee great garden and retail reception. And it’s infertile -- functionally sterile – so you won’t need to block any pesky pop-ups.No other grass crams more gold bars into such a small space. Rising just 3’ at maturity, the rich green foliage is heavily cross-hatched for a dazzling sunlit display. It’s the perfect hotspot for

Echinacea purpurea and hybridsOf all the native plants that have gone from America’s prairies to the world’s gardens, few have a history to rival that of the purple coneflower.For many years gardeners had two choices: Pinky-purple, and Not-quite-white. Then came 2002, when breeder Jim Ault of Chicago introduced the first orange and yellow hybrids. That was the genus’s Big Bang, and like the universe, it’s still expanding.Now, you can have your “purple” coneflowers in myriad hues, solids and bi c

Talk about intoxicating beauty! Spirits and flowers go together like, well, like wine and roses. Here’s a round of some of our favorite ornamental grasses. All share their names with fancy adult beverages. Miscanthus sinensis var. condensatus ‘Cosmopolitan’The Plant:Beautiful broad blades with longitudinal striping. Creamy white margins surround rich green centers. This is an impressive specimen, reaching up to nine feet in flower. Hardy in Zones 5 – 10.The Beverage:Every bar and bistro has its

Geography Lessons in the GardenA good mixed perennial garden can be a trip around the world – or at least across a continent or two. Today’s tour involves a plant whose name sounds deceptively like a land it did NOT come from. Nepeta kubanica Neptune (‘Bokratune’ PP29556)Is that a funky way to spell Cuba, land of cigars and Castro? Nyet! The specific epithet refers to “big-leaf catmint’s” ancestral home on the Kuban Peninsula in Southern Russia, on the Black Sea. This particular beauty was bred

Purple is such a striking hue, Rome once decreed that only the emperor could wear it. But it’s also one of Nature’s favorite colors. She bestowed it lavishly upon numerous genera in the plant kingdom and even some in the animal (think birds and fish).Verbena ‘Homestead Purple’ straddles the annual/perennial line: Technically it’s a perennial, but it’s tender enough that in northern climes, it’s used as an annual and replaced each year.Whichever way works in your zone, it’s a worthy addition to t