Kansas gayfeather seeds (Liatris spicata), purplish pink

Liatris spicata

Kansas gayfeather, blazing star, and spike gayfeather: this perennial of the American prairies has a feature that confounds every gardener the first time—the flower spikes bloom from top to bottom, the opposite of almost all other plants with flowering stems. A detail that makes it instantly recognizable.

Characteristics:

• Feathery spikes: long, dense pink-purple flower stems, very upright, from midsummer through autumn.
• Long-lived perennial: a single well-established plant can produce up to twenty flowering stems within three years.
• Very hardy: native to the eastern and central United States, it withstands our winters without difficulty.

Sowing advice:

• Exposure: full sun, essential for keeping the flower stems upright.
• Soil: ordinary, light, well-drained soil that remains cool in summer. This is the balance to maintain: it appreciates summer moisture, but its underground organ rots in waterlogged soil during winter. In heavy soil, plant it on a slight mound. Avoid excessive fertilization.
• Method: 4 to 6 weeks of cold stratification significantly improves germination. Then sow in spring, in pots or directly in the ground, covering lightly. Patience: flowering generally occurs in the second year.

Care advice:

• Water during dry periods in the first year. After that, it manages well on its own.
• Do not cut it back too early in autumn: the dry spikes remain decorative and provide food for birds.

Harvesting advice:

• For fresh bouquets, cut the stem when the upper third has opened. For drying, harvest at full bloom and hang upside down in the shade.

Beneficial pairings:

• Its upright form contrasts beautifully with the flat flower heads of purple coneflower and rudbeckia, its fellow plants of the American prairies, or with grasses such as blue fescue.

Benefits for biodiversity:

• It is one of the best butterfly plants for the summer garden: its nectar-rich spikes attract large numbers of butterflies and bumblebees over a long period.
• Its tufted seeds feed goldfinches in autumn if the stems are left in place.

Uses:

• Flower beds and borders, where it adds rare vertical interest. An excellent cut flower, fresh or dried, and highly sought after by florists.

Harvesting your own seeds:
Leave the faded spikes to dry completely on the plant until they become covered with fluffy tufts, then thresh them over a container, sheltered from the wind. See storing your seeds.

Commitment to Quality: at SemiSauvage - Permaculture, we grow and select our seeds with respect for all living things as our guiding principle. Based near the Auvergne Volcanoes, we choose reproducible, non-hybrid varieties, tested for their germination rate, carefully sorted and packaged, with no chemical treatment. Our belief: to give gardeners back the ability to sow, year after year, seeds that truly belong to them.

Bring elegant vertical interest to your flower beds with these Kansas gayfeather seeds.