I am assuming you want plants that draw attention and comments/questions from onlookers due to their unusual characteristics or simply because they are not typical of what you usually see growing. These are plants that I call 'head-turners" and they make people slow down to gape and point at your garden while driving by. I think I can give you some suggestions guaranteed to different and not be duplicated anywhere else within miles. Personally I think its best to develop a theme and stay with it rather than having a lot of attention getters like a museum collection of unusual plants. This means not every plant needs to be a focal point but should fit into the scheme in a harmonious way. The use of appropriate fillers makes a scheme like this work. Big rocks strategically placed can add to the unusual and taking out a standard lawn and replacing it with gravel, pavers and/or very low growing native grass & small native forbs really makes it different not to mention low maintenance. It depends on how far you wish to take it or what your neighborhood will allow. If you decide to plant cactus, Cold Hardy Cactus online offers a very wide variety of them with differing pad textures/color, sizes and color of blooms in spring and bright pears in autumn for year round color and texture interest. You need good drainage and full sun, this is more important than temperature for success. I have dozens of varieties and they do quite well because I am on a slope. Native grasses and forbs are a good way to bring it all together and create a very unique, unusual landscape. Here are some focal point plants with descriptions that will grow in zone 6 that have not been listed in the above posts that would create a Southwest flavor. DESERT SPOON-- (Dasylirion wheeleri) 3 ft wide dome of stiff light blue ribbon like leaves with hooked thorns along the edges. Puts up a tall flowering spike 12 ft tall when mature. LEAD PLANT--( Amorpha canescens) 5' x 5' drought tolerant native prairie shrub with soft grey leaves running up stems in bean formation. Spikes of indigo flowers in fall. Considered one of the most ancient prairie species. Very pretty. YELLOW BIRD OF PARADISE-- (Caesalpinia gilliesii) Rows of small leaflets on an airy plant with big yellow flowers each with a long red sex filament. Blooms summer through early freezes. APACHE PLUME--(Fallugia paradoxa) White rose flowers cover plant while simultaneously forming abundant plumed silky pink seedheads. Tiny leaves, the whole plant looks feathery. Looks great with low growing evergreens or native/ornamental grasses. BEARGRASS--(Nolina microcarpa or N. texensis) 3 ft tall evergreen with multitude of thin long shiny leaves that curl on the tips. Puts out a bloom in summer, looks grasslike but its not, its in the lily plant group. BIG SACATON (Sacaton wrightii) an impressive no care ornamental grass that puts up golden feathery seed heads in mid summer to 7 ft tall. Very distinct and different from what you usually see in the nursery's for ornamental grasses. This grass glows yellow in afternoon sunlight. DEERGRASS (Muhlenbergia rigens) handsome commanding ornamental grass 4ft x 4ft with thin spikes that grow straight up and out like a large fireworks display. Gorgeous. MEXICAN FEATHERGRASS--- Delicate silky grass low growing that is golden and soft all spring and summer. Good to tie in plants together or for textural contrast. CHOLLA CACTUS--- many varieties available. Adds a strong sculptural element. Cold Hardy Cactus has one called 'Snow Leopard' that literally glows in sunlight or on a moonlit night from the dense white spines covering it. SPANISH BROOM--- A big leafless green plant that looks like thin pencils all season or you could say it resembles a big weird grass plant except in spring when it is smothered in yellow pea like flowers making everyone ask "What is that?". Otherwise, its sculptural JIMSONWEED (Datura wrightii) large shrublike native perennial 3-4 ft high with large soft blue leaves enormous 8" white trumpet flowers. Attracts bees like crazy. YUCCA ROSTRATA--Very blue leaves forming a perfectly round head and a short truck (eventually). Monrovia has a very nice one available to nursery's you could probably find online. A very user friendly yucca since it won't try to stab you. 'MISS HUFF' HARDY LANTANA. It is reported to be the most cold hardy lantana around. Some reports list it hardy to zone 6. The 'unusual' factor here would be to have a 6 ft wide lantana in your zone 6 yard blooming heavily all summer making you the envy of many as butterflies flock in massive numbers. Thats how big it gets in a single season and if you don't trim it until spring and mulch it in winter, you might just be able to do one successfully. Its worth a try. Almost Eden online carries it. Cuttings are easy to root if you want to winter one over indoors for insurance or make more of them easily. COLD HARDY AGAVE-- There are some that will grow well in zone 6. Parryii, Utahensis and others. Kelly Grummons at Cold Hardy Cactus carries them as well as some small barrel types that are also hardy. He also carried various Yucca plants that are hardy. Good source for seeds of the plants above is Plants of the Southwest. You won't find them locally, you will need to search online but then, thats what makes them unusual and why you won't see them growing locally in your city. Unusual is a relative thing. What is common in one place is unusual in another. I grow all of these successfully in the midwest in zone 7 with around 30" annual rainfall but they can take zone 6. You do need good drainage though for some and tweezers on hand for others. Cactus are not for everyone but nothing else can make such a statement.

I am playing with Jack in the Pulpit seeds this Spring. My first batch (about 60) germinated fine in wet paper towels, about 75%. Then tragedy, overwatered in seed starter mix, I managed to drown them all. So sad. Second batch are in process, 69 seeds, 40 germinated so far. Planted only half buried with the root pointing down on top of Jiffy pellets. Taking GREAT care not to drown them. 20 of them have one leaf and the other 20 look good, except 4 which are definitely sick. I was waiting for the one leaves to turn into three, but now I read that one is all you get in the first year. I have another 40 seeds on order, just in case, however, now by the time they arrive I hope to be a pro. In my woods are plenty of lovely Jack in the Pulpit plants in bloom. All have three leaflet leaves. Many with the pulpit holding the jack. Just lovely, so delicate. Nowhere in my woods, and I have looked a lot, do I see the single leaf plants. The wild plants seem to spread by underground connectors, so they are grouped in clusters, all with triple leaflets. Last year I saw one bright red berry/seed cob. That is what got me going. However it disappeared one night. I think it was eaten. Hugh Tornabene (Maryland)

Welcome Jasmine 123, A wonderful, and often inexpensive, source for blooming size Arisaema sikokianum is Seneca Hill Perennials. She often offers other such treasures as A. fargesii, A. candidissimum etc. for very reasonable prices. I do not see A. sikokianum offered for this fall season, but it is often offered in the spring catalog. The New England Wildflower Society offered it in 2001 for a very good price as well and may have it to offer this coming spring season of 2003. My seedlings will not be available for at least another 2-3 seasons as the seed was only just sown in the fall of 2001. Sorry that I couldn't be of help myself, but maybe one of these two sources will be. Best of luck in your search. Lily Here is a link that might be useful: Fall 2002 Listing of Arisaema Offerings

Well, I'm certainly not a ginger person, but it looks like it is in the same general family atleast and perhaps a nicer variant, but the shape of the flower is like a vase as opposed to very flat and open as in the spicata variants on the link. I suppose a pic of the sex parts would be helpful.....is this useful for determining species of ginger?? It is really the only way to positively ID an Amorph or Arisaema. I'll ask the guy in India as he may have spicata and can tell if they are unique. Thanks again, and if there are any other suggestions please fire away :o) Dan