When fall gets here, I do like the typical warm colors. I get in the mood for pumpkins, fall decor, Halloween, trees turning, etc. Love the usuals: asters, mums, various shrubs that turn colors (going to plant some Kaleidoscope Abelias here), Russian sage, Mexican Mint Marigold, Flame Acanthus, ornamental grasses that turn colors .... and my various salvias come alive again, especially Greggiis. (They go a bit dormant in the hottest part of summer.)

I have zero trees at this rental, so am really going to miss my red oaks, Crapes, etc that turned such beautiful colors.

Sweet autumn Clematis, justicia, crape myrtles (mine turn burgundy) and ''Snow 'n Summer" Trachelospermus, Maximillian's daisy and fall sunflowers (Viguiera dentata).

Omar

I love my Crag lily ( echiandea texensis) , Ageratina havenense, Guitierez sorothrai, Palafoxia callosa. Boy do the bees and butterflies love the first three. I also forgot Salvia regla. blackfoot daisy and liatris muncronata.

Can you really hate this?

Common mums are extremely flexible. You can pair them with annuals to get away from the typical mum container.

The fancy mums are expensive and don’t do well in TX. Northern gardeners are lucky with the variety of color and forms of mums. Us, not so much.

Getting away from the traditional mum planting, can do container or inground.

1) common pink and common white with blue pansies or petunias. Totally away from orange/yellow thing.

2) red mum with ornamental green cabbage, oh my, will have to try this one.

Love the Chinese tallow tree but hate that it’s invasive. Hope someone developes a seedless variety.

Cape plumbago (Plumbago auriculata) is with blackfoot and four-nerve daisies in blooming through most of the season to frost. Root hardy in 8a in dry sheltered spots. Copper canyon daisy (Tagetes lemmonii) gives a nice fall bloom, though is also marginally hardy in north Texas... and some find its fragrance too overpowering. Like the chevron seed-heads in late summer on inland sea oats (Chasmanthium latifolium) as an attractive ornamental shade grass. Berries on Amercan beautyberry (Callicarpa americana) and coral berry (Symphoricarpos) are also very nice.

Turk's cap and mealy blue sage are one of my favorite summer/fall combos. They keep blooming until the first hard frost. Echinacea, salvia leucantha, tagetes lucida, aster oblogifolius, justicia brandegeana, cuphea micropetala (giant cigar plant), and various other salvias, cupheas etc. are always fall rock stars.

Dangged Salvia leucantha. So beautiful but doesn’t come back in my garden. I don’t know why.

Omar

My all purple form came back, but not the purple and white. They are in different areas of the garden. I think the soil is sandier where the all purple form is planted. Boy it sure looks pretty planted next to something yellow or orange, like one of the tagetes or tithonia (another one I forgot).

I have had lots of problems with S. leucantha also. I dug out a old huge Evergreen sumac that was in the wrong place. It left a huge hole and I enlarged that and added lots of compost and some decomposed granite sand. I also have dug in a homemade ollah for water and since last year, it has been happy ,. It returned and returned larger. I think it likes deep rich soil.

I guess so, Mara, but the thing is that it performs well for a year, and then, (crickets sound) nothing.

Omar

Is your ground dense. Do you cut it back early in the winter. If you do water might be going down the hollow stems and rotting the crown. i wait to cut any salvia till I see green new growth.

Oh, they are so pretty MizG.

ooh , I want a cutting!. They are nice. I will have to keep my eyes peeled for them.

I got it at Home Depot! I was looking for a little pot saucer out there, and saw these. They were solid red, but turned to pink and red last week. My Hot Lips have always done that, too ... gone from red/white, to solid red, to solid white.

I need some more of these for that bed, hoping they still have some. :)

Camellias usually do well for me in the fall.