AHS Heat Zone 9+

Plants that will live in areas that experience 120-150 heat days (AHS Heat Zone 9) each year where temperatures exceed 86 degrees F. Except for a few limited areas in the Texas Panhandle, our AHS Heat Zone is 8. Plants rated lower than AHS Heat Zone 8 may not survive the summer's heat.Plants rated higher should do just fine.

Common Name: Arizona Rosewood

Arizona rosewood is one of the few native evergreen trees or tall shrubs that are low water-use. Underused in the Texas Panhandle, mostly due to lack of availability. But with searching in Albuquerque or Santa Fe, one should be able to locate a specimen. Faster growing than the Chisos rosewood. Long slender, serrated, glossy green leaves with white flowers in summer.

Common Name: Standing cypress.

Reseeding biennial, native to Texas, and the southeastern US. The red tubular flowers make it attractive to hummingbirds. The upright stalks are brittle and break off easily.

Standing cypress will flower the first year, and may, or may not come back a second year, but you should see some seedlings. Transplant those. The glossy green foliage to the right in this picture belongs to Anisacanthus quadrifidus wrightii, flame acanthus.

 

Common Name: Big Bend Silverleaf

Big Bend silverleaf is the most cold hardy of the Leucophyllums and has wintered over in Amarillo, Zone 7, for 5 years so far. Possibly cold hardy to Zone 6. It is hard to beat a more attractive summer blooming shrub for small xeric spaces. After summer rainfalls, Big Bend silverleaf, native to the Big Bend National Park area, becomes covered in silver blue flowers that twinkle like jewels among its silvery gray leaves. Hard to find, it's worth searching for.

Common Name: Crape Myrtle

Grown in the South for decades, most people think of crape myrtle as a native American plant; it is however native to China and Japan. Small tree or large shrub that is cold hardy to Zone 7.  I’ve grown the same crape myrtles for over 20 years, but they’re planted close (too close!) to my bricked house on both the northeast and northwest corners. They’ve been stem hardy, not just root hardy, and have grown up to about 10-12’. In most cases, crape myrtle will not grow into tree form in the Panhandle, but there are mature, tree size crape myrtles in Amarillo.

Common Name: Century Plant, Agave

Agaves are striking and architectural Southwest native plants and are included in a group of plants I term Southwest evergreens. They are unusual in that at maturity, they only flower once, and then die. for this reason, some classify them as multiannual, rather than perennial. However, as they common name suggests, it takes many years before they flower. Leaves of the Agave are arranged in a spiral beginning from a near invisible stem, forming a rosette.Agaves vary in size from 4-6 inches to larger than man-size.

Common Name: Select Blue Catmint, Catnip

This is not one of the invasive catmints, but it will reseed some and is not as attractive to cats as most catmints. A low growing, sprawling, drought tolerant perennial that projects a hazy blue appearance with its light lavender blue flowers and grayish green foliage. It is aromatic, not necessarily fragrant. A fast spreader and prolific bloomer even in it's first year, it will begin to bloom after six weeks.

Common Name: Cactus

Not all succulents are cacti, nearly all cacti are succulents (a few exceptions). Nearly all cactus species are native to the Americas, providing a prickly evergreen presence. There are many cactus that are cold hardy for the Texas Panhandle. There might be one for your garden.

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