Many cold hardy drought plants survive freezing temperatures with no problem at all in your garden. Sedum, yucca, and coneflower handle harsh winters while still needing little water in summer. The key is picking plants rated for your USDA hardiness zone before you buy them. Some drought plants laugh at snow and ice while others die at the first hard frost.
Frost tolerant xeriscape plants include some of the toughest survivors in the plant world today. Sedum can handle temperatures down to negative 40 degrees in zone 3 and comes back strong each spring for you. Russian sage survives zone 4 winters and gets bigger each year in your garden. Coneflower spreads across zones 3 through 8 and blooms even after brutal cold seasons.
I grow sedum and yucca in my zone 5 garden where winter lows drop to negative 15 degrees F (negative 26 degrees C) most years. These plants sit under snow for months and never show any damage when spring arrives. My tender succulents from the desert all died the first winter I tried them. But these cold hardy types just keep coming back year after year in my beds.
You should know that drought tolerance and cold hardiness are two separate traits in plants. A cactus that survives desert heat may die in its first freeze because it never evolved to handle cold. Sedum stores water in its leaves like a succulent but also shuts down for winter and survives. Check both the water needs and the zone rating before you buy any plant.
Building a winter hardy dry garden means picking plants that match your coldest winter temperatures. Lavender handles zones 5 through 9 and survives moderate cold but not extreme arctic blasts. Agave needs zone 8 or warmer and will turn to mush in a hard freeze. Yucca handles zone 4 cold and looks great despite its desert appearance.
Your USDA zone shows the coldest temperatures your area sees in a typical winter season. Zone 3 gets down to negative 40 degrees at its coldest extreme. Zone 8 rarely drops below 10 degrees F (negative 12 degrees C) during winter months. Match your drought plants freezing temperatures tolerance to your zone to avoid losing plants.
Mulch helps your borderline hardy plants survive winters that push their limits in your garden. A 4 inch (10 cm) layer of straw or shredded leaves insulates the crown where new growth starts. Pull your mulch back in spring once hard freezes end so the crown can dry out and grow. Avoid piling mulch against stems, which can cause rot during wet winter months.
Winter drainage matters as much as cold tolerance for your drought plants in freezing climates. Roots sitting in cold wet soil rot faster than roots in cold dry soil do over winter. Make sure your planting site drains well before winter sets in each year for best results. Raised beds and gravel mulch help keep your plant crowns dry when snow melts.
My garden proves that you can have beautiful drought plants even in cold climates with harsh winters. I spend almost nothing on watering in summer and lose almost no plants to winter cold each year. Pick the right species for your zone and prepare your soil for good drainage first. Your reward is a garden that looks great in every season with almost no work from you.
Read the full article: Top 10 Drought Resistant Plants for Gardens
