A xeriscaped garden at Denver Botanic Gardens.
Whether your are looking to sell your home or just fix it up for the summer so that you are the envy of the neighborhood, Xeriscaping is a great way to make your yard look its best and help you save on your water bill. With the lack of rain lately, many people in Colorado are looking for ways to do just that, while maintaining a beautiful yard.
Xeriscaping is a great way to improve your home’s curb appeal. This is the first thing that anyone that drives by your home will see. When you are selling your home, first impressions are critical. You want your prospective buyers to see the front of the home and say, "I must have this one" before they walk in the door.
To xeriscape does not mean that you pull all of the plants out of your yard and put rock down! Xeriscaping means that you plant plants that can go long durations without water or don’t require much water at all. There are many beautiful plants that one can plant that meet this requirement and many of them are native to the area.
Here are a few of our favorites based on our own experiences and research into local nurseries.
Hummingbird Mint
The Hummingbird Mint has beautiful tall spikes of deep rose-pink flowers. It is deer resistant and attracts butterflies and hummingbirds, starting blooming in mid-summer through the fall. The plant requires full sun and takes two to three seasons to reach full size. It is a tall plant, ranging from 48 to 60 inches tall and is 24 inches wide at maturity.
Prairie Sundrops
Prairie Sundrops are best planted in full sun as the stems tend to fall without it. The yellow four-petal flowers grow on the green to greenish-red stems that have long hairs. The plant grows to be approximately 24 inches tall and 24 inches across. They bloom early to late summer.
Prarie Sundrops are a great addition to a xeriscaped garden!
Bloody Cranesbill
Bloody Cranesbill has brilliant carmine-colored flowers that bloom in late spring through summer. They grow approximately 12 inches tall and 18 inches wide. It needs partial to full sun. The deciduous leaves turn wine red in late fall. The perennial attracts butterflies.
Bloody Cranesbill has beautiful flowers.
Moonshine Yarrow
The Moonshine Yarrow has beautiful ferny light blue foliage and heads of soft sulfur-yellow flowers. The plant grows 18 inches tall and 24 inches wide at maturity. They grow in full sun. The plant is deer and rabbit resistant. It is easy to care for the plant and adds to any xeriscape garden. It is an excellent perennial, so you only have to plant it once.
The Moonshine Yarrow has beautiful ferny light blue foliage and heads of soft sulfur-yellow flowers.
Wisley Pink Sunrose
The Wisley Pink Sunrose is one of 110 varieties known as sunroses. It is ideal for erosion control. It needs full sun and blooms from late spring through mid-summer. These plants are relatively large, growing rapidly to 24 inches tall by as much as 36 inches wide. The Wisley Pink Sunrose has masses of pink flowers with gold centers flanking the stamen.
Apache Plume
Apache Plume blooms with single white five-petaled flower that set fluffy pink seed heads. It requires full sun. The Apache Plume blooms from late spring to mid-fall. The plant is deer resistant and attracts birds and butterflies. It is a large plant, growing 48 inches tall by 48 inches wide. It maintains its green color in the winter.
Shrubby Ice Plant
The Shrubby Ice Plant produces evergreen ground cover with succulent, blue-green leaves and many bright fuchsia-pink flowers in late spring through early summer. It is rabbit resistant. The ice plant is relatively short, growing to 3 inches tall and 12 inches wide. The plant is low maintenance and requires full sun.
Kentucky Coffee Tree
The Kentucky Coffee Tree is heat and drought tolerant, assuming that they’ve had two years of properwatering to establish their root system. They can reach up to 50 feet tall and 40 feet wide. The leaves turn bright yellow in the fall. The tree blooms in early summer, with white flowers that mature into seed pods into fall and winter.
The Kentucky coffeetree is heat and drought tolerant.
Fernbush
The Fernbush, also known as the Desert Sweet, has leaves look like little fern fronds. It grows between 36 inches to 108 inches high at maturity and spreads out as wide. Flowers appear in white clusters in mid to late summer at the tips of branches. They are white colored and have five petals.