American Native Plants, botanic garden, crevice, crevice garden, dryland gardens, flowers that bloom all summer, JLBG, juniper level botanic garden, limestone, native, native perennials, native plants, nature, North American natives, North American Rock Garden Society, penstemon, Pink Flowers, Plant Delights Nursery, rock garden perennial, rock garden plants, rock gardening, summer flowering perennials, summer flowers, sun garden, sun loving plants, sun perennials, sunny perennials, texas native plants, Tony Avent, zone 7b
We are enjoying the rare Penstemon baccharifolius this summer in our high/dry crevice garden. This species is native to limestone ledges up to 6,500′ elevation from the Edwards plateau in Texas south into Northern Mexico. This species hates our summer rains, and we had given up on growing this until we built our alkaline crevice garden a few years ago. Now it thrives, growing in 3′ deep Permatill gravel.
That is remarkable. Planted in what season so as to assure root growth would be adequate?
We don’t find the planting season matters. In crevice gardens, roots grow at extremely fast rates, and can easily reach 3′ long in just 1-2 weeks. If we plant in summer, we add some supplemental water for the first 1-2 weeks.