Lomandra
Lomandra longifolia
A tough, mounding tussock of long leaves — it shrugs off dry ground and resents ground that stays wet.
Light Full sun
Height 1 m
Spread 3 ft 3 in
Spacing 100 cm
Root depth 8–24 in
- Type
- Grass · Perennial
- Botanical family
- Mixed / other
- Foliage color
- Green · Gold and chartreuse
- Sunlight
- Full sun
- Feeding
- Gentle all-organic
- Frost tolerant
- Yes
- Flowering
- May
- Mar–Apr Bud Break
- Apr–May Spring Growth
- May–Jul Flowering
- Jul–Dec Growing
- Dec–Dec Winter Dormancy
- Jan–Mar Winter Dormancy
- Plant spacing
- 3 ft 3 in
- In-row spacing
- 3 ft 3 in
- Between rows
- 4 ft 1 in
- Square-foot density
- Not suited to SFG
- Root system
- A dense fibrous mat
- Working depth
- 8–24 in
- Can reach
- 5 ft down where the soil allows
- Spread
- 3.5–6.5 ft across, about 1–2× the width of the plant
- Shallowest pot
- 12 in of soil
Thousands of fine roots knit the top of the soil into a turf, which is what holds a bank together and what makes an established clump so hard to lift. Prairie grasses send a few roots far below the mat as well.
The habit is Lomandra’s own; the figures are what that habit usually comes to at this size, not a measurement of this species. Roots follow the soil either way: a compacted pan, a high water table or heavy clay stops them well short of any of it, and deep open ground lets them go further.
- Root & crown rot Root rot where the soil stays waterlogged.
- Leaf tips browning off, occasionally, in a hard drought.
Grasses, like this one.
The Cottage Garden Companion — the gardener's herbarium at cottagegardencompanion.com