Interested in meadow sage and iris and ranunculus. Please see my trade list and let me know if you are interested in any of the daylillies I have listed Melissa

Hi Bill, I guess it's that time again, planning what to grow where. I have also tried Delphiniums and Hollyhocks. I love them both. The Delphiniums did grow for me, but I didn't find it easy to keep them going. They were doing well in one location and I decided to move them and they didn't like it and died. Hollyhocks are gorgeous, but the foliage is always a mess of rust by the time they bloom. Tree Oracle's Lupines are gorgeous. They are easy to grow from seed and worth a try but not as tall as either of those. I would also encourage you to try lilies again. Yes, there is a red lily leaf beetle, but it doesn't eat the bulb, it eats the foliage. It can make a mess of it, but where you are, you might not get it. You could ask around. You would know it if you did, they are bright red and visible. I have them in my yard so I limit the number of lilies I try to grow and I hand pick the small beetles. Last year, I found I was able to stay on top of it by just knocking them off into a 5 gallon bucket of water and my liles were beautiful and well worth it. You might want to try purchasing a growing plant of lilies instead of the bulbs. That is how I purchased mine. I have Casa Blanca Lilies and they are one of the easiest plants in the garden for me. They get between 4-6ft tall. I don't do anything to them aside from picking off the RLLBeetles. I don't even fertilize them. They bloom the beginning of August. You mentioned liking something spikey or spires. There are lots of tall garden Phlox as Carol suggested and 'David' is one of the best as far as disease resistance, but there are others that are as well in different colors. Hardy Hibiscus is worth considering. They bloom late and look good at the back of the border. They also can be grown from seed but take awhile to establish. They have hybrids out, lots of them. I have 'Plum Crazy' that I bought in a gallon size. Penstemons can get tall, I have 'Iron Maiden' and it can get as tall as 4 ft. Malvas are similar to Hollyhocks but their blooms are much smaller and can get 4ft as well. Liatris is spikey. Agastaches are spikey, not sure what the tallest of them are, but there are a lot. Easy to grow too, if you have the drainage for them. Digitalis and tall Iris bloom together. I do consider some of these middle of the border plants though. I grow both Baptisia and Verbascum that were mentioned. I love them both. Baptisia can definitely handle the back of the border, it gets large and it has that spikey effect. It is easy as pie, another plant I never have to do one thing to and it looks good after it blooms too. Never a disease or an insect problem. Verbascum grow well for me too and are spikey but are middle of the border to me. Plus they have a basal growth that you cut back to after bloom so that leaves the back of the border empty again. Have you ever considered growing a rose or a Butterfly Bush at the back of the border? Butterfly Bushes are easy too and they can get 6-7ft tall. They also have new varieites out that are supposed to be dwarfs that top out at 4-5ft. They bloom a long time, they attract butterflies, they are fragrant. Other than that, Sunflowers might be fun to try for a year. They get tall, you can grow them from seed, feed the birds in the fall. Since they are annuals if you don't like them, you can try something else the next year. Here is a link that might be useful: Verbascum 'Southern Charm'

LilyNut, they are all SO pretty! But I especially love Lillium Shocking! Very nice and I'm sure the fragrance is 'to die for'!!!

For shorter asters with late blooming, try Purple Dome or Violet Dome at around 2'. For other cascading ideas over the wall, try Saponaria ocymoides -- it can reseed, but will be less of a problem on a wall. Also look at miniature roses (aka "groundcover roses"), many of which have a creeping habit that works cascading over a wall. And some vines can cascade over a wall -- I have a Lonicera periclymenum 'Harlequin' that works well. The catmint (Nepeta fassinii) suggestion is a great one, since its foliage shoots up early, recovers quickly from cutting back after bloom, gives a second round of smaller blooms, and looks good pretty much throughout the season. Buy one plant, divide it every spring, and you're set for life! As for lilies and daylilies with your 18-inch height requirement: Asiatic lilies, Oriental lilies, and Daylilies (Hemerocallis) all have dwarf cultivars that would fit your bill. Stella d'Oro is an infamous Hemerocallis dwarf cultivar... but you can easily pick out other dwarf cultivars of lilies, for example, that fit your color schemes and height requirements by ordering bulbs to plant this fall (e.g., see Hallson Gardens at perennialnursery.com which has a variety of dwarf varieties). One other way to keep your plants within your size range is to think about pruning/cutting back strategies. The Perennial Garden book by DiSabato has extensive info on how to do this for many different flowers. By cutting back many plants by, say, half in early-to-mid-June, you can easily turn a 3' plant into a fuller 2' plant, or a 2' plant into a 18-inch one, etc. By cutting back later (e.g., early July), you can turn a late-Summer bloomer into an early-Fall one, too. The bonus of cutting back is that you'll also get fuller plants that won't require staking. (But don't cut back your lilies or daylilies!) Note that the garden mums option is also best with a few rounds of pinching! And the Sedum spectabile 'Autumn Joy' suggestion can be shaped with pinching, too, to keep it at 18 inches or smaller... see DiSabato's book for an extensive discussion on this point.