Full Sun Landscape Ideas
If you have dry, sunny areas on your property and wish to grow plants there, you need to select full-sun plants that are known for their drought-tolerance. Following is a list of perennials that qualify. Many of these perennials are popular in rock gardens. Also see my companion piece, 10 Best Perennials for Sun.
Note that a location in your landscape is considered to be in “full sun” if it receives 6 hours or more of direct sunlight daily (on sunny days).
Examples of Low-Growing, Flowering, Full-Sun Plants
My first two choices for full-sun plants are both low-growing, mat-forming plants effective as ground covers and popular in rock gardens. The first is yellow alyssum, a perennial not to be confused with annual or “sweet” alyssum.
Second on my list of full-sun plants is a rock garden favorite, snow-in-summer. That picturesque name derives from its appearance in bloom, but snow-in-summer is grown just as much for its silvery foliage as for its mass of snow-white flowers.
Full-Sun Plant for Tactile Delights
Another full-sun plant with silvery foliage is lamb’s ear. This low-maintenance perennial is not only drought-resistant but also deer-resistant. And you will not be able to resist reaching out and stroking its velvety leaves.
Examples of Succulents
We continue with the “barnyard” theme with the present entry, hens, and chicks. Like the following entry, it is a hardy succulent, providing Northern gardeners with an instant “Southwestern” look.
Interlude: Choices for Shrubs and Ground Covers
Before continuing with perennial selections, consider the examples I provide of full-sun plants that fall into the shrub and ground cover categories:
But now let’s get to the five remaining perennial entries in my list of 10 full-sun plants. In comparison with the somewhat unusual entries dealt with above, these plants for dry, sunny areas are well-known even to non-plant lovers.
Old-Time Perennial Plants for Dry, Sunny Areas
For those of you who are buffs of classic cartoon trivia, yarrow and similar plants (for example, Queen Anne’s lace) may remind you of the villain, “Flat Top, ” in the Dick Tracy cartoons. Not that there is anything villainous about yarrow flowers; in fact, they are associated with a great hero from ancient Greek mythology, as I relate in my article. But the flowers do grow in clusters that give this perennial its trademark flat-top look.
The shasta daisy flower “looks the part” of a plant for dry, sunny areas: with ray-like petals radiating from a bright golden disk, each flower is a sun unto itself.
