Durable delights: Eyelash grass turns heads in dry garden
This is one part in a weekly series featuring the UC Davis Arboretum Durable Delights, 30 can’t-fail, easy-care plants well adapted to our region.
Blonde Ambition showy blue grama grass
Bouteloua gracilis‘Blonde Ambition’
Size: Under 2 feet tall
Bloom season: Summer, fall
Exposure: Full sun to partial shade
Pruning needs: Cut to ground once a year to renew.
Water needs: Once established, water deeply twice a month.
Snapshot: Also called “eyelash grass,” blue grama grass is a very tough, drought- and heat-resistant California native. Blonde Ambition is the showiest variety of this popular turf alternative; the flowers and seeds of this sun-loving, warm-season grass are even bigger than the straight species. The leaves are a deep blue-green (hence the name). For native landscapes with low water, you will not be disappointed in blue grama grass’s fluffy late summer display of buff-colored flowers that hang around well into fall. You can see specimens in the arboretum’s Mary Wattis Brown Garden of California native plants on the UC Davis campus.
More online
See photo galleries of the arboretum’s Community Favorites and Arboretum All-Stars at sacbee.com/home_garden.
This story was originally published October 19, 2013 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Durable delights: Eyelash grass turns heads in dry garden."