I put Northwind switchgrass in a semi-shady spot, and it hasn't grown at all. With all the rain we've had this year, it really should be taking off, so I'm convinced it's the lack of sun. It only gets sun for maybe three hours in the late afternoon in summer. I had my fingers crossed that it would be enough, but it sure doesn't look like it. That's probably not the answer you wanted. Now I have to decide what to do with the seven (yep, seven of them) I planted along my driveway.

Michelle

Big Muhley does grow in a fair amount of shade but it grows differently . A little more draped. Is it in clay? It does not much like clay, I think. It does like drainage in the soil. I have Big muhly growing under cedars and oaks with most of the day in shade and part shade. It grew slow but it is of a nice size now. Not huge. I am in its native range so this is on limey rubble. This one planted itself there.

Roselee, Thanks for the ideas. Really like the color guard yucca, but concerned about spikes (and tall urns?) just off the pool where there's occasional horseplay when people younger than us visit. I do have another place I'd like to put one. Canna would look nice there, but already have quite a bit in an adjacent isolated bed... maybe time to replace those with standing cypress :-). Variegated inland sea oats would likely do well, but was hoping for something a bit taller, not familiar with other variegated grasses that will reach 3 or 4+ feet in partial sun. Will give the porterweed a closer look, too. Did notice how persistent leaf damage is on 'Macho Mocha' after the squirrels tore one up right after it arrived from a trade last fall, good to learn they can also split easily on their own when larger. Think I'll find a less prominent spot for it.

Dragonfly, Our spot probably gets almost 6 hours of full sun during the summer months, but partial to full shade the rest of the year. Wonder if it's enough to make a difference. Have read switchgrass tends to sprawl and fall over without enough sun, so am guessing they'll flop into the pool reaching for light as the Sun recedes in the fall. May still try a couple different cultivars since I have other places they could be used. Hoping yours give better results once they have their roots down. Thx!

Wantonamara, We're on the Blackland Prairie, so clay could be a factor, though it is in a very well draining hillside bed. It initially grew well to its present size, but has not changed noticeably the past two seasons and foliage has seemed sparser than it should be. Will see if more light makes a difference if it survives transplant. Have been casually looking and seen some very nice examples of the smaller Muhlys, but haven't noticed any Big Muhly growing well/large in our area outside the Dallas arboretum... guess that might be a hint.

Bostedo,

With six hours of sun in summer, you should give a switchgrass a try. It'd be dormant during the winter, so shade wouldn't matter. They say they flop in shade, but mine are standing straight and tall (even though they're only three feet.) Hope that helps.

Michelle

Michelle, Thanks - I am going to try one or both of the cultivars I mentioned depending on availability. Several weeks of fence shade during the early growing season and almost
another 90 days at the end really gets the more phototropic plants leaning away from the
fence towards the light. Not sure why they're so different, but know flame acanthus and some sages/salvias can get to bending pretty badly while abelia, India hawthorn, gaura, and pampas grass tend to remain much more upright and symetrical within the same exposure. Am interested to see how switchgrass and some of the others behave.

Pink muhly grows all over Houston in amended clay, albeit slower. Bostedo, I can't offer input about grasses you mention. Grasses are "en vogue" in Houston but personally I am shy with them b/c afraid of them becoming snake hideaways

Your big Bluestems would be a thing to look into . there are some very nice varieties like Red October and Black Hawk. If you want to learn more about them , ask on The Ornamental grass forum. TexRanger has trialled many of them in her garden. I think that she grows in sand that she brought in over native clay .

Santa Rosa's Andropogon page

This is a good site to look at lots of grasses.

Mara were u talking to me? I made a quick morning round and took pics of my only grasses. Purple fountain grass, ophiopogon and pink muhly (is that same as m. Linderheimerii?)

purple fountain grass (andropogon) looking a little ratty. In my area landscape crews give them severe haircuts in late winter. I did it once and I don't think it liked it so I stopped. However with public landscapes you never can tell what is thriving from being properly maintained vs what is replaced when nobody's looking ha

Ophiopogon

I was talking to the OP, before.

Bossyvossy, Isn't Purple Fountain Grass a pennisetum, a rather tender one? That is what I think when I think Fountain Grass. They normally are too tender for me. M. capillaris is the Gulf Coast Muhly , Aka the pink blooming puff of cotton candy. Big Muhly is M. lindheimerii. Santa Rosa has a missprint calling the M. Capillaries "Big Muhly"

Bossyvossy, Pink/Gulf Muhly (m. capillaris) is one of the smaller ones that does well in our area, too. Though Mexican Feather grass seems to be used much more these days. One I thought might be big muhly (m. lindheimeri) doing well just north of us in Plano turned out to be pine muhly (m. dubia). Really like the purple fountain grass, but more of an annual here since has not been reliably hardy for us where exposed. The mondo grass bordering our pool deck did "positively die" when the Mulberry giving it partial shade came down. Unfortunately the nutgrass included in the original mondo flats continued to do just fine. Interesting caution about snakes sheltering in large grasses. We commonly have the very small garden variety snakes, but only found signs (skins) of large ones in the shrub/grass pool border while ducks were regularly nesting there 2 or 3 times a year. Thought they were probably after eggs/ducklings since have not seen new signs after replacing the heavy plant cover (and adding inflatable gator to the pool) has kept the mallards away. Will be watching out if we end up with a dense grass cover again.

Mara, Didn't realize the Santa Rosa site wasn't working with Privacy Badger in Firefox when I visited before and had been unimpressed. Figured you hadn't really sent a link to a shop with only one grass plant in its inventory, so tried another browser and voilà... very nice - thanks. Will check out the big bluestems.

"Pink Flamingo' Muhly is a naturally occurring hybrid of M. lindheimeri and M. capillaries. It does get large.

Lindheimerri Muhly does very well for me, even in difficult spots of dry clay & it tolerates quite a bit of shade up here in OKC. I grow them in dry spots because otherwise they get too huge. Mine look really good growing in an area infested with tree roots on the high end of my property but I did give them a good soak twice this summer.

Switchgrass on the other hand needs quite a bit more water and looks better with more sun, it tends to be stunted with lots of browning leaves in in dry years and doesn't color up here like it does in other parts of the country where summers are less intense, mine usually just turns from green to brown. I've never seen any red on the varieties that are supposed to turn red. I read the same thing happens to the guy on the Plano Texas Prairie blog, his tend to just go brown in fall. Switchgrass likes water. The best looking is 'Northwind' & I ordered several more to do a mass planting. My 'Heavy Metal' ones didn't do as well and are terribly dry looking but tall.

Big Bluestem needs a lot more water than L. Muhly to grow good, at least the younger plants do, otherwise they get lots of brown leaves in summer. I have them planted with 'Northwind' switchgrass in my lowest spot where its easy to soak and where the water drains down when it rains. I watered them when it was very dry. The single "Red October' Big Bluestem I have growing on the hot, full sun, dry hell strip will be moved come spring (poor thing). I've got some very tall types of Little Bluestem that do great there and which are almost as tall as me but Big Blue suffered badly this year. In a friendlier spot, those Little BS would flop but as it is, they are are tall, straight and a deep rich mahogany color after being gorgeous light blue all summer.

There is a gas station here that has the plain non-named local genotype of Big Bluestem planted in mass. All of them look dried up, deadish and terrible in this drought summer we had here but its been extremely dry since spring.

The best muhly grass for areas getting lots of shade time but at least 3 hours of morning or afternoon sun is Pine Muhly and the much bigger Deer Muhly (if you have a really big space). They seem to be impervious to drought no matter how dry it is, I read they thrive on drought and maybe thats true.

Pink Flamingo Muhly grass down on the dry hell strip is a giant. Don't fall for that "fits in a narrow space" malarky. Its the biggest grass I have.

Thanks bostedo and Mara for clarifications. I have been very clumsy lately with botanical nomenclature

Bostedo, I don't think snakes "live" in those grasses but I will never forget carelessly sticking my hand into some mondo to remove sedge growing in it when a huge non venomous snake slithered away from me. I dont know how I didn't faint....

Mara, 'Pink Flamingo' is an interesting option. Wonder if it picked up any better tolerance for clay from m. capillaris? The original pampas grass we had in the spot was supposed to be a dwarf pink variety, but turned out to be a standard that was mistagged by the grower.

Texasranger, PF size should not be a problem as long as it doesn't get bigger than pampas grass. Thanks so much for your insights on the other options. Nice to know the tempting "red" switch grass cultivars probably don't make sense in our location. I do like the form of 'Northwind' for a couple spots on our lot, so will give it a try when it starts shipping again. I like 'Dallas Blues' mainly as a local native selection, but appears it can be much less upright. Wrongly thought little bluestem was a much shorter (~30 inches) grass, will have to take a closer look at both the little and big options. So many grasses... so little time :-)

Suppose our big muhly could be stunted from root damage in our clay due to our unusually wet year. Just confirmed it was planted from a 4 inch pot in 2012 where it grew well the first two years, then just sort of halted at a ~1 gallon size.

bostedo, sorry, I was misleading about the Little Bluestem height. The named cultivars for sale in the market are all much shorter but then so are many of the roadside native ones, they can vary quite a lot around here. These particular ones I have on the strip were grown from seed I collected, they are quite tall, very light blue and I ended up calling them 'The Okies'. I have several named cultivars but they have shorter leaves in summer with shorter bloom stalks in fall and the stems look more delicate with closer spaced fuzzy seeds on them and they turn more pink. purple & red which fades to light pink in winter. The winter color of the tall ones is darker and they look wilder than the named ones.

Thanks for the clarification - sounds like you've done well with your seed collectioning. A couple of the named cultivars I just looked at list heights up to 4 ft, which is still quite a bit taller than I expected, though more seem to be at 3ft or less.