That Floofy Thing on Top

When you’re interested in gardens, people ask you questions about plants. When you’re interested in gardens enough to volunteer for the Horticultural Society, more people ask questions – of all kinds. Most of the time, people ask about re-potting their plants or how much water they should give their cacti. But, an interaction with one woman has stuck with me. Here’s sort of how it went.

Woman: What’s that plant outside with the long leaves and that floofy thing on top? Me: Cattail? Milkweed? Woman: No. It couldn’t be that. Wait. I’ll go take a picture with my phone. (pause) Here it is. Me: Oh. That’s purple fountain grass. Woman: It can’t be grass. My grass at home doesn’t have that floofy thing. Me: Well. That’s because we mow the grass before the seed head forms. If you stopped mowing your grass, it would get a seed head, too. Not quite as magnificent as the seed head on the purple fountain grass, but it would get one. Woman (to the other volunteer): She’s kidding me, isn’t she? Other Volunteer: No. She’s not kidding.

I was talking to a couple of friends about “that floofy thing on top” and Courtney reminded me that some seed heads aren’t floofy, they’re spiky. Since that weekend, I’ve been looking at grasses and noticing their seed heads. From far away, they all do look “floofy” – almost like a fox’s tail -- but up close, some are quite stiff and others are spiky. I don’t have any grasses in my garden (I took these snapshots in a neighbor’s garden) but because of that one conversation, and a couple weeks of looking closely at grasses, I’m thinking about including them in my garden next year.

What about you? Do you have grasses in your garden? Are their seed heads floofy, stiff, or spiky? Post a comment and let me know!

Note: Apologies for the lack of Purple Fountain Grass photos. I haven't seen any since my volunteer shift!

Images of Grass and the Prairie

I’ve been thinking about grass and grasses this summer—lawns and prairies—ornamentals and natives. I’m not a huge fan of lawns. They’re a lot of work. And, there’s a lot of pressure to match your neighbor’s lawn height. People have told me that gardening is more work than a lawn, but when I see people on their hands and knees digging dandelions and pulling quack grass and crab grass and pieces of clover and violets, I think they’re wrong. In a garden, once pulled the weeds, you’re done! In a lawn, you still have to get out the mower.

When we planted the community garden, the city had not yet cut the grass on the knoll and it was between knee and thigh high. As I carried plants (and later buckets of water) from my car to the garden, I imagined pioneers in long pants and dresses walking along side covered wagons in grass of a similar height.

The view from my office overlooks a highway embankment and ramp. The embankment is covered with various grasses and prairie plants (monarda, ratibida, rudbeckia, oxeye daisies, bergamot, and knapweed). The colors and textures are mesmerizing some afternoons. The grass and plants are waist tall in places on the embankment. The same plants and grasses fill the fields on the way to the community garden by the office. The aroma from the grasses and wildflowers is intoxicating. I couldn’t imagine being a pioneer walking through grasses and flowers this tall. It would be almost like swimming in Jello – lots of effort.

A friend and her daughter just returned from DeSmet, South Dakota, where they were visiting the home of Laura Ingalls Wilder—complete with stay in a covered wagon. In one photo, the daughter is standing in a field of waist high wildflowers in period dress. It’s exactly what I had imagined.