9 Varieties of Blazing Star for Your Native Garden

9 Varieties of Blazing Star for Your Native Garden:- Seeking a gorgeous vertical addition to your native garden? Blazing Star brightens flower gardens and attracts wildlife. Gardening expert Melissa Strauss discusses her favourite US native flower species. Native gardening helps your home ecology by supporting native pollinators, animals, and insects. Naturally, finding beautiful native plants that will thrive in your environment is the first step in establishing a native garden.

9 Varieties of Blazing Star for Your Native Garden

What are Blazing Star plants?

• The drought-tolerant shrub Liatris, or blazing star, has towering, eye-catching flower spikes.
• Few flower garden elements provide verticality like this pollinator attraction. This native plant has lovely foliage and lengthy blooms that add colour to the yard.
• The fuzzy flower heads are usually rosy purple, although some have fluffy white flowers. Bees and butterflies love them for their nectar and closely packed blooms.
• This plant adds delicate, linear texture to your beds with its fine, grass-like foliage that blends with its neighbours.
• Its drought tolerance and low nutritional needs make it one of the most low-maintenance native garden plants.

Benefits and Range

• All of the US, most of Canada, and Mexico have blazing star types. The 32 liatris species feed a variety of fauna.
• This plant attracts pollinators during its extended blooming season. Rodents like to eat liatris’ meaty underground corms and delicious stems. These Asteraceae plants attract monarch butterflies, and birds like the dried seed heads if left on the plant after blooming.
• Blazing Star is easy to care for and gives the garden character. This plant is drought-tolerant and soil-tolerant, so you can enjoy it without much effort. Let’s look at some common native garden flora.

1. Alba

• This flaming star grows two to four feet tall, adding vertical interest to flower beds. This species can reach six feet in the wild. Well-fertilized ‘Alba’ blooms top-heavy, so stake them if they lean.

2. Floristan Violet

• The fluffy flower heads on three- to four-foot stems bloom from top to bottom over four weeks. Autumn brings beauty to the grassy foliage, which turns bronze. Birds eat plant seedheads in winter. This cultivar tolerates heat well.

3. Kobold

• ‘Kobold’ is identical to ‘Floristan Violet’ but with magenta flowers instead of purple. This small cultivar attracts native pollinators with three-week blooms. Similar bronze autumn foliage.
• This shorter type dries well and cuts beautifully. In a native garden, these nourish bees and birds and form a meadow. The cottage garden benefits from all liatris’ vertical lines among shrubbier flowers and herbs.

4. Rocky Mountain

• The Rocky Mountain Blazing Star is found in central North America, from the Rocky Mountains to Canada, it is less heat-tolerant but still magnificent. It is a beautiful pollinator garden addition and a popular Monarch butterfly nectar source.
• For six weeks, the huge rosy-purple flower spikes bloom from the top down. Fine grass-like foliage becomes deep golden in autumn. These flower spikes may need staking if they bloom during a rainy season since they can flop over.

5. Texas

• The lavender-hued Texas Blazing Star is less cold-tolerant and more drought-tolerant than most species. The towering flower spikes have fine grassy leaves, adding garden texture. This rock garden-friendly variety prefers gritty, well-draining soil. It can handle higher pH soil than others.
• Overwatering this species in winter, when it is dormant and consumes less water and nutrients, can cause root rot. It tolerates hot, dry areas and requires little care. It feeds migrating birds and supplies nectar.

Also Read:-How to Plant, Grow, and Care for Stock Flowers

6. Prairie

• One of the tallest Liatris species, Prairie Blazing Star grows up to five feet tall and is native to the Central US. Butterflies and other pollinators feed on the thickly flowered, fluffy flower spikes in rosy purple. Fine grassy foliage contrasts with the dramatic flower spikes.

7. Rough

• Late blooming Rough Blazing Star is found throughout the central and eastern US. Late summer sees the rose pink, fluffy flower heads bloom in succession over three to four weeks. Long, lanceolate leaves are blue-green in spring and summer, bronze in autumn.
• It likes medium to somewhat dry soil. Although drought- and heat-tolerant, it won’t survive in damp soil in cold weather. Easy to care for, this plant attracts beneficial insects and resists pests. Tall flower spikes may need support in rainy conditions.

8. Dotted

• The smaller Dotted Blazing Star is more cold-tolerant than its Texas counterpart. It’s drought-tolerant and enjoys dry weather. overly much water makes the stalk overly long and flops over as the blossom blooms.
• This flower cuts well due to its long stalks. The dense, rose-pink flower heads bloom from top to bottom. Put the dotted variety in full light and well-drained soil. Since this plant is susceptible to overwatering, drainage is crucial, not soil type.

9. Dwarf

• Appalachian Blazing Star, a small cultivar, grows naturally in the Southeast. Low mounds of soft, grass-like leaves have many flower spikes. It thrives in dry, well-draining, poor soil. These thrive in rock gardens.
• It’s smaller than others. Flower spikes reach two feet, and foliage is one foot tall. Small clusters of pinking-purple blooms top each stem in less dense flower heads.August blossoms last two to four weeks.