Perennials for the Sun: A Guide to Choosing the Right Plants for Your Garden

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In planning your garden, it’s fair play to go to your local nursery and grab whatever you like the look of. However, if you’re interested in garden design and the best shot at successful and happy plants, incorporating some strategy and thought in choosing your flowering perennial plants will go a long way.

What is a Perennial Plant?

First, let’s talk about what a perennial plant is not. You know when you go to a garden center in the spring and there are plants already blooming with bright flowers and you’ve been starving for color all winter and you Must. Buy. Them. All? Those are annual plants, plants that will die in the fall of the year you put them in the ground. You get the instant satisfaction of pretty colors in your yard, but you’ll have to do it all over again the next spring, and the one after that.

Perennial plants may die back to the ground in fall or winter (some don’t), but their roots are still alive, and, year after year, each spring the plant will come back bigger, stronger, and with more blooms. These are the plants we use to build a garden that will become more lush and beautiful every year.

What are the Benefits of Perennial Plants?

Aside from lasting years, there are other benefits to planting perennials. Many perennial flowers will bloom all summer, and they are beneficial to birds and other creatures in our yards, as they create habitats and dependable sources of food.

While the upfront cost of the plant may be higher than for an annual plant, the lifetime cost will not be. This is true not only because we spread that cost over years, but because one perennial plant can easily be separated as it matures and become two, or ten, or twenty plants over time.

How Do You Divide Perennial Plants?

Most perennials are happy to be divided, and in fact, some must be divided in order to thrive. Talk of green thumbs can cause people to believe plants are delicate and complicated. The truth is, the vast majority are hardy and can take a bit more roughness than you might imagine.

There are two basic ways I divide a perennial plant. The first is to use a sharp-edged shovel. Pressing straight down on the shovel with my foot, I can separate the roots belowground. It’s then easy to dig out only the section I want to move. The other way I divide a plant is to dig the whole thing up. Some plants’ roots will easily separate into pieces once they’re out of the ground. Others will need to be split with a shovel, as above.

Bulbs are perennials which need to be dug up and separated. When the plant is scooped out of the ground, you will find that the bulb has multiplied, with smaller bulbs attached to it which are very easy to take off with your fingers and replant elsewhere.

Where Should I Plant My Perennials?

When making a garden, a good mantra is, “right plant, right place”. If we can find just the right plants for different spots in our yard, they will thrive with very little input from us.

In order to put the right plant in the right place, you need to become familiar with the land. Where does the sun shine all day? Where is it shady in the afternoon? Is there an area with dappled light? Does it feel much warmer near the wall of your house? When it rains, where do puddles form?

The land you live on is not all one climate. There are microclimates – pockets and hilltops, large empty areas, windbreaks, and spots near a building or fence. To learn more about this concept, I recommend the book Gaia’s Garden, by Toby Hemenway. It may take a couple of reads to really understand the many things that create different conditions in different areas of our property, but in the meantime, you’ll have the basic idea and can start planting. You’ll see what fails and what is happy, and over time you’ll learn more from your real life experience than you ever could from a book.

Once you’ve gotten to know the land, it’s time to research which plants will do best in the conditions of whatever areas you choose garden. There are plants that want only full sun and some that want full sun but will tolerate partial shade. There are plants that will only grow in full shade, drought-tolerant plants, and plants that like to keep their feet wet – they don’t want to live in a dry spot. You can find out the needs of each plant with a simple Google search.

You’ll also want to research how big the plants will get, keeping in mind the amount of space you have available to plant, and when they will bloom, so you don’t end up with everything blooming in June and there being no flowers in the garden for the rest of the season.

What Color Perennial Flowers Should I Choose?

You should choose whatever colors appeal to you. There are no rules! It can be good to pay attention to how many of each color you purchase, though, so you don’t end up with a garden that is all one color. (Unless that’s the look you’re going for – it can be gorgeous!)

How Many of Each Plant Should I Buy?

With so many perennials available, it can be tempting to buy just one of lots of different kinds. A lot of new gardeners start out that way, and it can be a good way to learn.

To make a cohesive garden, though, consider limiting the number of varieties you choose, and instead get more than one plant of those varieties. Large swaths of the same flower make a garden look intentional and full. It can also be a good idea to plant the same variety in different parts of the garden to provide balance. If you only have a few though, I recommend planting them near each other.

Three is generally a magic number in design, and that holds true in the garden. If you can afford more than three, stick with an odd number for the most attractive outcome.

What Full-Sun Perennials Should I Buy?

If you’re lucky enough to have some sunny spots in your garden, you’ll find many more options are available to you. There are plenty of shade perennials to make beautiful shade gardens (we’ll cover those next month), but your choices in a sunny spot are almost endless.

Below, I’ll save you a bit of trouble and list some of the best perennials to plant in the sun.

The first thing to check out is the plant’s growing zone. You can find out your growing zone with the USDA’s Plant Hardiness Zone Map. Plants outside of your zone will not grow in your area. Because I live in Zone 6b, my favorites may not be appropriate if you live in a very cold or very warm climate.

Remember also to look at size, whether it can tolerate partial shade even though it does best in the sun, what colors the blooms are, and what the bloom time is.

12 Full-Sun Perennials for Your Garden

Here’s some of my favorite full-sun perennials. I’m also including some important information that will help you to determine if they are the right plants for you.

‘Proud Berry’ Coralberry
Zones 3-7

The Coralberry is a shrub, growing 4’ tall and 4’ wide. It has berries of the most amazing pink, which unfortunately are not edible for humans. (The birds would thank you, though.) The berries hang onto the plant into the winter months, a nice pop of color under a light snow.

It prefers full sun, but will handle a bit of shade. It blooms in late summer, and the flowers develop into berries in the fall. It’s branches with berries are beautiful in a flower arrangement.

Pyromania Solar Flare Red Hot Poker
Zones 5-9

This plant grows 3’6” high and 2’6” wide, with bright yellow flowers of an uncommon shape. It blooms all summer and makes a great cut flower.

‘Curtain Call Deep Rose’ Japanese Anemone
Zones 4-8

This Anemone is happy in sun or part-shade. It grows to 18” tall and 18” wide, with pink flowers. The flowers bloom in late summer and early fall.

Red Creeping Thyme
Zones 5-10

Growing only 6” tall, this plant makes a beautiful magenta-red groundcover. Each plant will spread to about 10” wide, but over time they will spread even further. Planted short distances away from each other, they will form a large mat. Creeping Thyme works well on rock walls and between paving stones as well.

Mango Tango Anise Hyssop
Zones 6-9

This sun-loving plant grows 18” high and 16” wide. It can handle dry conditions and prefers a spot with good drainage. It’s peach and orange flowers bloom from mid-summer to early fall.

Prince of Orange Oriental Poppy
Zones 3-7

Vivid, orange, ruffled petals surround a dark center on this bright and happy plant. It prefers full sun, and grows 2’6” tall and 2’ wide. It blooms from late spring through early summer.

West Country Manhattan Lights Lupine
Zones 4-9

This variety blooms in part-sun and sun, and grows 3’ tall and 2’ wide. I love the classic blue Lupine, but what makes this one a favorite is its yellow and burgundy-purple flowers, which bloom in spring and early summer.

Beyond Midnight Bluebeard
Zones 5-9

This Caryopteris shrub variety produces tall blue flowers. It blooms from late summer to early fall, just as many flowers are checking out for the year, and grows 2’6” tall and 2’6” wide.
It needs full sun and good drainage to thrive. Soggy soil will cause root rot, killing your plant.

‘Denim ‘n Lace’ Russian Sage
Zones 4-9

This is a completely different plant to the sage we use as an herb. Its leaves are toxic and should not be eaten.

Denim and Lace provides beautiful wands of purple-blue flowers, on a plant that will grow to be 2-3’ high and 2-3’ wide. It prefers full sun, and blooms throughout summer to fall.

Decadence Deluxe ‘Pink Lemonade’
Zones 4-9

This is a Baptisia, sometimes known as False Indigo. Baptisia is available in a variety of colors, but Pink Lemonade is among my favorites. With its yellow and raspberry flowers, you’re getting two colors for the price of one.

It is a large plant, growing 4’ tall and 4’ wide, and almost looks like flowers in a vase, as it is narrow on the bottom and very full on top. It blooms from late April through June.

Dulce ‘Spearmint’ Coral Bells
Zones 4-9

This plant grows 10” high and 2 ½’ wide, and produces flowers in mid- to late summer which are light pink on the bottom and darker pink nearer the top. It is happy in sun or shade. It’s green leaves have a bit of a silver tint to them, providing interest even when the plant is not in bloom.

Delicious Candy Echinacea
Zones 4-8

This is a vivid pink flower. It grows 4’ wide and 6’ tall, a really sizable plant. They can handle part-shade, but will not produce as many flowers as they would in the sun. Echinacea is a medicinal plant. Blooms in mid-to-late summer.

Do you have Enough Plants for a Full-Sun Perennial Garden?

I first want to acknowledge that buying plants can be an expensive endeavor. Making a garden is not something that has to be done in one swoop. We can buy plants as we can afford them, and some years from now we’ll have the garden we imagined. And remember, gardening friends will be happy to give you splits of their plants, and some plants are easily grown by seed.

If you were to purchase everything on this list, you would have purple, yellow, raspberry, pink, red, orange, and burgundy flowers. Between them all, they would provide at least one blooming plant from late spring to winter. But remember, you may want to consider choosing fewer varieties and getting more of the ones you do choose.

Whatever you choose, keep in mind that gardening isn’t about perfection. It’s about playing in the dirt, connecting to nature, and expressing your creativity. Whatever you think is beautiful, is beautiful.

What is your favorite full-sun perennial to grow?