My Top 5 Drought-Resistant Plants for a Low-Maintenance Garden

Like all gardeners I’m always looking for ways to preserve water or use less water in my garden and one way to do it is by including plants that can survive in drier conditions.

It was impossible to get my list down to 5 so here are my top picks plus two honourable mentions!

ALAN IS USING:
Plants by Blue Diamond Centres – https://rb.gy/xsfvf1
Bench by Forest Garden – https://rb.gy/vqscm2
Trowel and Fork by Spear and Jackson https://rb.gy/6wl4lh

ALAN’S LIST:

(Honourable Mentions)
Stipa Tenuifolia – Ponytails
Nepeta – Purrsian Blue

Top 5
5 – Cistus Pulverulentus Sunset
4 – Helianthemum – The Bride
3 – Sedum Sunsparkler Pum Dazzled
2 – Eryngium Magical White
1 – Agapanthus – Ever Sapphire

ALAN’S GARDENING BOOKS:
https://www.penguin.co.uk/search-results?tab=books&q=Alan+Titchmarsh&x9=author&q9=Alan+Titchmarsh&categoryLabel=PW-200000

My name’s Alan Titchmarsh, and I’m absolutely delighted to welcome you to my YouTube channel! I’ve been a gardener for over 60 years and I can safely say that gardening is one of life’s greatest joys, and I can’t wait to share it with you.

Whether you have green fingers or just starting out with your very first window box, join me in my garden for practical tips, step-by-step guides, and plenty of friendly advice to help you make the most of your garden — large or small.

So pop the kettle on, pull up a chair (or a trowel!), and join me each week as we celebrate the wonderful world of gardening together.

Subscribe now and let’s get growing! 🌱

🎵 ALL MUSIC BY NARRATIVE MIND 🎵

Home

#AlanTitchmarsh #GardeningTips #GardenDesign #PlantCare #GrowYourOwn #OutdoorLiving #GardenAdvice #Horticulture #HomeGardening #GardeningForBeginners

I’m always looking for droughtresistant plants that can cope with less water. So, without further ado, here are my top five. [Music] [Music] So, what are the top five? Well, this one has to figure the sun rose. [Music] This is cystus sunset. It’s a reliable form of sunrose. Now cystus is a shrub which is semi evergreen. It’s fairly low. It tends to make low mounds and in that respect it’s really useful particularly in small gardens. There’s nothing much to see during the winter. But then come late spring and early summer, out come these flowers, which look as though they’ve been made from tissue paper. The petals are all sort of crumpled as they unfill from the bud. Each flower might only last a day or two, but when they fall, you can see lots more are coming behind. Loads of buds right the way across this downyd plant. If a plant has downey leaves, very very tiny hairs packed all over the leaves themselves, that means they’re generally growing in a very hot situation because the little hairs stop water from leaving the leaves quite so rapidly. So hairy leaf plants are generally a fairly good bet for dry droughtridden conditions. If you have a long narrow droughtridden border, plant it entirely with cystases and from the beginning to the end of summer. You’ll really enjoy these flowers. In at number four, this is the rock rose. [Music] Perversely, because its Latin name is helanthemum, helios, sun, anthem, flower. So this should really be either a sunflower or a sunrose. Again, it’s evergreen. It’s much much lower. It scramles over rocks on a rock garden if you want or it will just be a really good border edger right at the front of a bed or border. Spread sideways for two or three feet. Never grows much more than about 9 in to a foot high. And it can be studded with flowers of either white, yellow, pink or orange. This is the bride. These flowers are going to be white with a yellow center. Always look at the label. Gives you a good idea about what you’re in for. The rock rose is a really good doer from really dry, arid, rocky conditions. You don’t need to grow on a rock garden. Just make sure that with all these plants, as well as enjoying sunshine, the soil is well drained. And at number three, a plant that as every school child knows will cope with drought. A succulent sedum sunsparkler plum dazzle. [Music] All the hardy sedums, the ice plants as we call them. Why ice plants? When you feel the leaves, even on a warm day, they’re cold to the touch. That’s the ice plant. A lovely thing for a sensory garden. Uh for school children, too. They love it. Succulents like cacti and succulents can cope with drought. And this is a cracker. And the foliage here has got this lovely plum tinge. Underneath the leaves are slightly gray on the underside, but you’ll see the combination of the gray and the plum is lovely. And what it has is lovely clusters of starry pink flowers towards the end of summer. It’s a good late flower. So if you’ve got a garden that is always at its best in June and then it sort of fizzles out come the end of summer. The sedums are fab flowering right the way through July, August, September on towards the frost. And this is hardy. It will cope with frost in the garden and it will stay evergreen. Why does it feel cold to the touch? There’s lots of sap in there, lots of fleshy growth, and rather like insulation in your loft, which stops heat from escaping, this depth of tissue on the plant stops it reacting too quickly to a rise in temperature, so it will stay cool for quite a long time. [Music] At number two, sea holly arenium. [Music] Now, sea hollies are called sea holly because some of them grow on the seashore and they’ve got spiky leaves like holly. It’s as simple as that. But they are really useful plants in a warm, hot, dry, sunny border. They have really thick roots and those thick roots are capable of drilling down and finding moisture where they need them. The foliage isn’t particularly good-looking. Uh it’s got sort of a slightly serrated edge, but the stems come up, which means that this can be buried among other plants. The stems get quite tall. Some of them four or five feet tall. This particular one is a new variety. It’s called magical white lagoon. And the flowers which open in the center of these thistlelike heads will be white. In many instances they’re blue, but magical white lagoon here they will be white and the hairs around them are white as well. It’s really useful this because it flowers over a long period from mid to late summer. You can even cut it, hang it up in a dry place and it will dry for winter flower arrangements. I find them really good what you might call firework plants. put them in between other plants which are sort of low and like a tray of scon. And up we’ll shoot this firework like a a rocket with these gloriously spiky heads. And finally at number one, the most spectacular of all, agapanthus, the African lily. Now there are lots of agapanthas. They used to be quite tender. Hardier ones have been bred now. And this label here claims it will go down to minus12° C, provided that drainage at the roots is good. And this race of agapanthus, the ever panthas as they call them, flower for a longer period over the summer rather than just in one quick flush. Here you can see youngsters coming through to flower weeks after these. So looking at the whole range of flowers on this agapanthus, you’ll see what value you’re getting for money. But the blessness of these flowers, they’re also available in white. But for me, true blue is the color of agapanthus. And to bring stature to a bed or to a pot, they’re really handsome if you plant them in a large terra cotta pot. Look at that. A couple that didn’t quite make it. They were only just outside. And the first one is the ponytail grass. [Music] Grasses as a whole are pretty drought resistant. The important thing with all droughtresistant plants is that to establish them, you’ve got to give them a chance. So when you first plant them, do give them a good watering and keep doing it until they get established. Then once their roots are down, they can cope with drier soil. The lovely thing about steeper or styper tenuifogolia is that it’s great for filling in gaps where you don’t necessarily want red, orange, pink, yellow all together. Use these as little buffers in between brighter colored plants. You can divide them. If you buy a plant like this and you know funds are a bit short, knock it out of its pot, divvy it up into three or four chunks that you can tear apart, plant it and water it in well and you’ll end up with a little forest of ponytail grasses. It seeds itself gently and it’s just wonderfully elegant. In every passing breeze, it will just move. Lovely thing. Children love this. It’s very tactile. You’ve got to stroke it. Just one thing, do try and stop them from putting scrunchies on them. You know, they don’t like that at all. Another one that didn’t quite make the top five and now I really rather wish it had cuz it is so useful. This is NPA [Music] Persian blue. Nanipita is catmint and Persian is spelled P Ur S I A N. Persian blue. It’s a cat mint. When you squeeze cat mint, you get this amazing aroma off it. And that’s what cats love about it. I remember growing it years ago when we had our first cat when we were first married. It never got a chance to grow because the cat would shave it off at ground level when it was coming through. It enjoyed it so much. They are fab. These cat mints. There’s one called Walkers Low as well. One of the faults they can have is a lot of them grow too tall and then they topple. So, they need a bit of staking. But this one, Persian blue, I really like this. I’m going to go for this one. Now, all these plants are drought resistant because they tend to come from countries and areas where water is in short supply. They’ve accustomed themselves over the millennia to being able to grow in dry soil once they’re established. I can’t emphasize that enough. Don’t think, oh, it’s droughtresistant. Plant it in dry dust. It’ll be fine. It won’t until its roots are down. So, there we are. My five plus two top plants for a droughtproof garden. What would be on your list? Comment below. Let me know. Gardening has changed my life. So, let me show you how it can change yours. I’ll be posting new videos every week. So, subscribe and let’s get gardening together.