May I suggest Blue Imperial Giant larkspur. I've purchased this from seed, and it is the perfect plant for winter sowing. Also phlomis cashmeriana is unusual looking and has lavender colored blooms. I'm going to link to a photo below, but it appears more pink in the photo. It's halfway down the page. I also love Rocky Mtn penstemon, Wasatch Penstemon, and Pikes Peak Purple. Oh and Rondo mix, though it comes in pink purple and blue. I guess you'd have to pick it out while it's in bloom at the nursery to get just the blue/purple shades. All three in this photo are Rondo mix. I see I need to add some veronica and the salvia leucantha by those photos above. I think that adenophora is so pretty too, but I wonder if it could take this climate. Also I sent you an email offline David3511. I'm dying to know where to find the white epilobium in your photo. Barb Here is a link that might be useful: Cashmere sage

Hi veryzer - my uncle lives in Sycamore & I could easily imagine him grabbing his rifle cuz someone's creeping thru his yard! Lol - he wouldn't hit you - he'd just try to scare ya! But knock on his door 1st & you'll have a friend for life! Ken - I'd just collect some seeds from the roadside plants & try sowing them in various spots. I got New England Aster plants from a local native plant sale sponsored by a prairie conservation group. It's perennial but not too prolific around here - which is why it's an important restoration plant. It can withstand long drought & brief flooding, but I think a particular fungus can quickly eliminate them from an entire area. Rabbits chew on them in the spring, but it's not a big issue as they get side shoots & make a bushier plant. My mom got her short incredibly brilliant variety from a local store (most likely Wal-Mart) but she didn't keep the tag (if it had one) & has no idea about it's identity.

Yes esh ga that is it! Good job! You've just identified all of my mysteries. I'd never recognize it without the berries, but that surely is it. Yucca. Everywhere. Took my son to a specialty doctor last week in duluth, and we tend to take the long way (shorter distance, longer travel time) because I like it so much better than going all the way down 75 to 285 and across. So we take 140 all the way to roswell instead. It's a nice winding country road. I must have seen yucca growing in a few dozen yards. Now I had yucca here when we first moved in, but every spring it became literally covered in thousands of little bugs. I don't know what they were, but the yucca was planted right next to the garage door. I have a teenaged son who skateboards; he practically lives in the garage and on the driveway. After living here for a few years now, I have changed my mind about that, and I no longer let him leave the garage door up all summer because of air conditioning costs. We live in a raised ranch, so allowing the garage to fill up with heat isn't wise. I didn't know that then, and I tore out the yucca and planted a rose vine to keep the yucca bugs from infesting the garage. But the yucca keeps coming back! I cannot seem to get all of its tuberous root. Since it is determined, and I am cheap, this year I dug out part of it as could be dug out and planted it elsewhere -far from the house. What are those bugs? It's been a couple years so I don't remember them, except for that they were smaller things, and they flew, and they apparently travelled in packs of hundreds and loved yucca. And on that same basis -the fact that I'm cheap- I might have considered moving some elderberry into my backyard. My backyard is pretty big, and almost completely bare. When we moved in there was nothing but a large pool and a row of wax myrtles growing behind it up against the fence. I pulled out all but four of the myrtles the first year, and have been trying to get them evened out ever since. I started planting other things, and planning a nice big veggie garden, and then my husband brought home a large rambunctious labrador "puppy". Long story short ending, I have revised my backyard plan to basically a shrub garden. If you could see my still pretty bare back-yard you'd understand my considering the elderberry shrubs, lol.

Well, I'll have a lot of seeds at the end of the season, so I could be a "seed source" for you! They would be easy to mail. I don't know how often you'd find this at Pike's or HD, but the smaller nurseries might have it. On the web, it is often found listed by stores that sell aquatic and aquarium supplies. But it grows fine in a garden or a bog.