Garden Talk

Plants that would appear flat and bleached out in bright sun come forward and shine or have a luminous quality in soft autumn light.  First Sporobolus heterolepsis  - this grass turns up  over and over again in planting plans by Oudolf in Noel Kingsbury's book  "Planting - a New Perspective"  At last I had it pointed out to me this week in a friend's garden.  It is unbelievably delicate, a fine cespitose grass (this means it won't elbow out its neighbours, thug style) in the image above it is and is offset by self seeded Verbena bonariensis. Then an aster - an any old aster of the sort that people dig up in clumps, complete with ground elder garnish and give away to any half interested gardener.  That is my excuse for not knowing its name. It makes a really good co-planting with veronicastrums and the taller sanguisorbas.