Peter Dowdall: The joy of using ornamental grasses in the garden

Irish Examiner

7 days ago

There's a certain something in a garden that makes it a bit special, that gives the space an extra nuance. It's a secret ingredient, not always easy to put your finger on it, but it's that clever use of texture that comes by using ornamental grasses in the mix.
Ornamental grasses come into their own at this time of year, pushing up soft plumes and seed heads that catch every breath of wind and turn ordinary borders into living, moving, entities.
It's the movement that grasses bring which makes them so captivating. It's in the way that they sway and ripple with even the slightest breeze, unlike many of our garden plants that stand rather stiff, heavy and upright.
They break up static planting, drawing the eye across the garden and adding a layer of texture that changes hour by hour with the light and wind. There's something calming, almost meditative, about watching grasses dance, a quality that seems to deepen as the evenings start to stretch into night.
Miscanthus sinensis, with its tall, elegant stems and feathery flower heads, is a superb choice for the back of a border. Varieties like Morning Light or Ferner Osten, add height and a gentleness that never feels heavy.
For a lighter touch, Stipa tenuissima, the Mexican feather grass, is hard to beat. Its fine, hair-like blades spill and flutter so delicately that they seem almost to shimmer.
Pennisetum alopecuroides, or fountain grass, with its bottlebrush plumes and neat mounding shape is just lovely in drifts or tucked in amongst late summer perennials.
I defy anyone to pass a Stipa or Pennisetum and not want to touch it or simply watch it moving.
That's what a plant or a garden should do, it should captivate all the senses and encourage the visitor to connect with and to become part of the space. That's why I can't abide those signs that you sometimes see 'Stay off the grass'. I would much rather see signs promoting the message to 'Take off your shoes, get on the grass, roll in it, play on it, connect with it!'
Grasses teach us to look differently at a garden. Rather than focusing only on bursts of colour or big floral displays, they invite us to appreciate the interplay of textures, writes Peter Dowdall. File picture
Ornamental grasses mix brilliantly with flowering perennials, helping to create that modern meadow look which feels so relaxed and natural. Try weaving them through patches of echinacea, rudbeckia or verbena for a loose, informal feel that still offers plenty of late colour. The contrast between sturdy daisy-like flowers and airy grasses is one of the easiest ways to give your borders that effortless, naturalistic style.
Texture isn't just about fine versus coarse, either. Grasses can be wiry or silky, upright or cascading, stiff or supple. Miscanthus, for instance, brings an almost architectural quality with its strong upright stems, topped by feathery plumes, which contrast wonderfully with more rounded plants like sedums or globe thistles.
Molinia or moor grass is another exquisitely elegant addition to the party. Their slender, upright flower stems rise well above the foliage in summer, topped with delicate flower panicles that seem to float in the air.
As autumn comes, many varieties take on stunning shades of gold and amber, adding another season of interest. Molinia is especially effective when planted where the evening sun can backlight those fine seed heads.
Meanwhile, the much softer texture of a grass like Deschampsia cespitosa, the tufted hair grass, creates a dreamy, meadow-like effect, through which sturdier flowers can poke.
When it comes to cutting back, many gardeners reach for the secateurs in autumn to tidy up as soon as plants start to brown. If you're one of them, let me urge you this year, to be a bit different.
If you can bear to leave your grasses standing through winter, you'll be rewarded with months of subtle beauty. Frost and low sun transform seed heads into sparkling sculptures, while smaller birds will feed on the seedheads and perhaps even shelter in the foliage.
It's only in early spring, around February or March, that I take the grasses down, cutting them back hard to make way for fresh green growth.
Grasses teach us to look differently at a garden. Rather than focusing only on bursts of colour or big floral displays, they invite us to appreciate the interplay of textures, the way different leaf forms bounce off and work with one another and how the garden moves and shifts with the slightest breeze.
There's something wonderfully unforced about gardening with grasses. They blur the edges, invite wildlife, and let you design with movement and texture to enhance the shapes and colours.
That texture that I referred to at the start of this piece is the secret ingredient that turns a collection of plants into a truly special planting scheme and grasses are the masters of it.
Right now, as they begin to flower and show off their late summer finery, is the perfect moment to appreciate all they bring and perhaps plan to add a few more for next year's gentle garden performance.