Drought Tolerant Plants and Photos Around the Gardens

I hope when you read this post that the rains are coming down in a delightful shower to water your garden, because they certainly aren’t here! It’s dry, extremely dry. Working in the ground is like cutting through a brick. Fortunately we’ve planted plants over the years that can tolerate these dry drought conditions.

Autumn sage is one of those drought tolerant sages that is a reliable performer.  It hasn’t stopped blooming yet this year which is different from most years.   Usually it blooms in the spring then stops during the summer then picks up blooming strong in the fall.  It can be easily propagated through cuttings and also through seed.  I just gathered seed for it the other day that I’ll plant next spring.

Even though this isn’t the native beautyberry (Callicarpa americana) this Callicarpa dichotoma does quite well in our dry periods.  It’s beauty is spectacular in the fall when bunches of purple berries cover the branches. Beautyberry is very easy to grow from cuttings.

Black and Blue salvia is another tried and true drought tolerant plant.  It never fails to perform well. It also is very good at feeding the hummingbirds!

Monarda isn’t always thought of as being drought tolerant but ours seems to do well under a small amount of shade.  Locating it in a good spot is also important as both of the plants in the following pictures are sited where the soil is more rich than other areas of our yard.

Daylilies seem to do great even when the weather isn’t ideal.  I’ve been extremely pleased with the performance of ‘Primal Scream’.  This orange beauty is a definite eye catcher!

Rudbeckia is always a nice choice for drought tolerant gardens.

Here is a Tennessee coneflower – or perhaps a hybrid.  I’m not entirely sure as it came to me from a plant swap.  Whether the echinacea in the picture is a Tennessee coneflower or not the Tennessee coneflower itself is very drought tolerant and thrives in the less than ideal soils of cedar glades.

One of my favorite over perennials period is the heuchera!  Here is one little tiny flower from a heuchera called ‘Paris’.  ‘Paris’ sends up clusters of beautiful coral red flowers.  I’ve found that all the heucheras in my garden have done very well when water is scarce!