I have a Cub Cadet BC509. It comes with a string head and a brushcutting blade. It is a 4 cycle engine so you do not have to mess with preparing the gas oil mixture, and more importantly the gas does not evaporate and leave the 2% Oil to mess up the gas jets, and other critical areas of the fuel system. Once you pump the gas through the system it starts as instructed. It cost $230 or about the cost of other brands of string trimmers in the same class. I use it for all trimming jobs in my 3/4 acre yard. I performs well as a string trimmer around the flowers, house, and similar areas. Change to the Brushcutter blade and you have a weapon to attack those tall grasses, small shrubs, and low hanging limbs. I use mine routinely to cut back the 4' weeds on a vacant adjacent lot, cut blackberry brambles, greenbrier, grape vine, poison ivy, and other brush that collects around the yard and in the woods immediate to my lot. It can accidentally cut of a 3 foot tall holly tree that you did not intend to cut down, and the small pines that come from nowhere. Based on my experience with the Cub Cadet BC509, it would quickly take care of things like pampas grass, and other ornamental grass.

Hi Jennie, Yes, I will collect seeds :D Yes, I have quite a few that haven't germinated for me and some that did but didn't do anything after. Cypress Vine has been a HUGE disappointment...they came up but never grew past 2"!! Out of two attempts, Moonflower (I. alba) never germinated and same with Yvonne's Salvia. Also didn't get squat from our native Blue Elderberry, Lamb's Ear, Sweet Pea (twice), Liatris(twice), Phlox paniculata, Rose Orach, Hosta...oh yes, there's a few!! LOL! Vera

Jean - I hope you meant the 25th (the Wake Forest market is only on Saturdays). Lets aim for Saturday Sept 1st. This next weekend is a big grilling festival at the market and I need to haul as many sellable plants as possible to make up for the lackluster sales these past couple of hot and dry marketdays. I will also go through all my various stashes of plants to find more goodies by Fall Swap. And next spring I should have even more after sowing seeds all winter. I have Rue. But the caterpillars on it are eating it down to the nub so I doubt I will get seeds. I plan on finding some seed somewhere and growing a bunch of it, so at some point I will have some available. I do have some parsley potted up and some Agastache (Hyssop). If you find any of the annual butterfly weed (Asclepias currasavica)(sp?), I have been able to over winter the roots and got bigger plants the next spring. I simply dig them up after first frost and pot them up and store them out of the way. They are easy from seed also. Pentas are a great nectar plant and they are easy from cuttings but they won't overwinter outside. Good luck

You just cannot go wrong with Calamagrostis acutiflora Karl Foerster (green) or Overdam (variegated, slightly shorter). With blooms it will get to about 5' tall. It has a couple of interesting bloom stages and is completely non-invasive. Best of all, it's a cool season grass so it wakes up and starts growing quite early. Cut it down once a year in the spring, and that's it. I have never watered mine - just whatever the sky brings is what they get. No fertilizer required, either. Here's a pic of it in my yard