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Easy-care perennials grow themselves

Easy-care perennials are on almost every gardener's wish list.

But many perennial plants are not quite as low maintenance as advertised.

Some have to be divided every season or two, others are short-lived and some grow so fast that they choke out their neighbors.


Easy-care plants for your garden

Easy care perennials - daylily
Daylilies are easy-care perennials

There are plenty of great, easy-care perennials that can be star performers in your garden.

Larry Hodgson, a prolific gardener and author of the best-selling Perennials for Every Purpose has put together a good list of qualities easy-care perennials should have:

  • Longevity (90 percent alive and thriving five years after planting)
  • Resistance to disease and insects, so you don't have spray them
  • Don't need to be divided more often than every four or five years
  • Tolerance of a wide range of growing conditions
  • Cold hardy – no winter protection needed
  • Good tolerance of summer heat
  • Long blooming period, or foliage that's attractive all season
  • Won't take over your garden
  • Don't need to be staked.

That's a lot to ask of a plant. "In fact, it's surprising, says Larry, "how few perennials meet all the easy-care characteristics. Phlox, for example, meets almost all of them except for disease and insect resistance: keeping them mildew-free can be a summer-long nightmare."

He points out that some easy-care perennials like peonies need staking. Many otherwise ideal plants are either invasive – goutweed is a prime example – or tend to disappear after several years – such as lupines and shasta daisies.

Easy-care perennials to try

"There are easy-care perennials you can plant this season, and expect to see blooming away happily in five, 10 or even 15 years," says Larry.

Here are Larry's favorite "no strain, no pain" easy-care perennials:

  • Astilbe
  • Avens (Geum)
  • Bergenia (Bergenia cordifolia and its hybrids)
  • Blazing Star or Gay-feather (Liatris)
  • Butterfly flower (Asclepias tuberosa)
  • Candytuft (Iberis)
  • Coral bells (Heuchera)
  • Cranesbill (Geranium)
  • Daylilies (Hemerocallis)
  • Fringed bleeding heart (Dicentra x 'Luxuriant')
  • Pinks (Dianthus)
  • Gas plant (Dictamnus albus)
  • Globe thistle (Echinops)
  • Globe-flower (Trollius)
  • 'Goldsturm' Black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia 'Goldsturm')
  • Hosta –thick leafed varieties are more slug proof
  • Lady's mantle (Alchemilla)
  • Leopard's bane (Doronicum)
  • Monkshood (Aconitum)
  • Ornamental grasses
  • Peony (Paeonia) –single-flowered varieties don't need staking
  • Stonecrop (Sedum)
  • Siberian iris (Iris siberica)
  • Solomon's seal (Polygonatum)
  • Speedwell (Veronica)
  • Yarrow (Achillea)

Related information:

More easy-care perennials: plants with great foliage

How to plant perennials

Back to main Perennials page

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