How to Grow Ornamental, Decorative and Garden Grasses

Of all the different Ornamental grasses, Stipa tenuissima is a favourite. A fabulous-looking grass with many very fluffy flower heads. It is so tactile, impossible to walk past without stroking it. S. Tenuissima is fully hardy and fast growing up to around .6m. It needs nothing more than a trim back in the spring and a sunny, well-drained spot. S. Tenuissima is also illustrated right image, with Dierama, Angel's fishing rod. S.tenuissima looks good with many garden plants including late flowering perennials such as Echinacea purpurea, Helenium and with Allium sphaerocephalon, which is the late flowering variety . 

Also known as peasant grass, this is another very tactile, multi stemmed variety of Stipa. The plumes are soft and become more open as the plant flowers. Just visible in the images is Verbascum an ideal planting companion.

S. calamagrostis grows to around 1.2 metres, it is fully  hardy and grows best in a sunny spot. It will die back over winter and any remaining stop growth can be cut back in early spring, ready for the new growth.

Another commonly grown grass is Stipa Gigantea, known as Golden Oats, which grows best in moderately fertile soil with plenty of sun. Gigantea, as the name suggests, is large grass which grows up to 2.5m with large Oat like flower heads. I took this image at RHS Bridgewater where the Stipa looks effective towering over mixed planting in a border.

It is semi-evergreen, and it is best to remove dead leaves in spring. The growing conditions described above are the ideal conditions, but it is a tough grass tolerant of many different types of growing conditions. I have several self seeded S. Gigantea, which are growing in a boggy area next to the stream. 

An arching grasses with light pink spikes which turn a shade of red/tan as the summer progresses. Also known as fountain grass, because of its arching habit, it is easy to grow in any conditions apart from damp/boggy conditions. It is best in full sun.

This variety of Pennisetum is fully hardy and will grow to around 1.2 m.

 One of the easiest Ornamental grasses to grow of is Molinia, a tough and trouble-free grass, making it ideal for planting troublesome parts of the garden. It will grow in most places. It will grow in partial shade and it is fully hardy.  

It is hard to capture on camera how this grass will shimmer and M.caerulea  known as Purple Moor grass as it has a delicate mauve hue to it. All Molinia grasses have a fine shimmering look and good Autumn colour. 

There are some fabulous ornamental grasses on sale in the garden centres and online, but some are not fully hardy, which can be a problem in many parts of the UK. Not all plant labels make clear the hardy rating of a grass and this is very important.

Illustrated left is a  very popular Ornamental grass, Pennisetum alopecuroides, commonly known as fountain grass 'Red head' which looks just fabulous. But it is H3 rating, which means it is only hardy in mild or coastal areas, and will require winter protection without which it is liable to be killed by winter weather. Plants are expensive and it's very disappointing when they do not come back the following year. It's not just a question of right place right plant, the Hardiness rating is critical.