Love Grass
The jury’s still out on how much I really like grasses in gardens. I’m not talking rolling green plains here (there’s a whole other jury devoted to deciding my opinion of lawns), but the tall, feathery, ornamental grasses. Generally they just remind me of pampas grass growing in desolate wastelands and roadsides. But while working at a local bush regeneration nursery (where we grew many, many native grasses that started to blur a little bit…), there was one tiny little grass that caught my eye. It had beautiful mauvey-pink seed heads that somehow reminded me of little hearts. It was called Brown’s lovegrass. The name lovegrass may have triggered the image of hearts because I look at them now and you have to squint REALLY hard to make a heart of the seed heads, but nevertheless, it took my fancy.
Brown’s lovegrass seed heads. Not really heart shaped at all are they?
Eragrostis brownii is a native grass, found right across Australia. It was discovered by Robert Brown - hence the species name ‘brownii’. Brown was a Scottish botanist who (I declare knowledgeably but only just found out after a google rabbit hole) is one of the most important botanists in Australia’s history. He visited Australia on Matthew Flinders’ Investigator voyage - the first to circumnavigate the continent ‘New Holland’, as it was known then. Brown took back thousands of specimens, although many were lost during his return voyage on the Porpoise (still with Flinders) when it was shipwrecked in the Coral Sea. Despite this, when he finally got home, he went on to publish a number of pioneering works on Australian botany.
Brown’s lovegrass seed heads mixing with chocolate cosmos.
To be honest, I’m a little iffy about a local bushwalk to look for native orchids, let alone a two year long saga to find grasses in far away pasturelands! Granted he is also credited with discovering more exciting plants such as Grevillia and Eremophila - but still! That’s dedication.
The genus Eragrostis - which is derived from the Greek eros, meaning love and agrostis meaning grass - is found in many countries and climates. It tends to be cultivated primarily for forage or as an ornamental plant, but the ancient crop Eragrostis tef has been a staple grain in Ethiopia for thousands of years. If you have never tried injera, an Ethiopian flatbread made with teff flour, you are missing out!
But back to my lovegrass. Eragrostis brownii can grow to 60cm tall and has thin flat leaves to accompany its delicate seed heads. It loves an open sunny spot reminiscent of the woodlands and pastures it grows in natively. My plant is currently gracing one little spot in my garden, adding that ‘etheral feel’ that so many landscape designers claim to obtain from grasses in their plantings. I’m still not sure I’ll ever branch out and include taller, more ‘statement’ ornamental grasses like the popular fountain grass (Pennisetum), which just screams rampant uncontrolled paddocks (sorry if you’re a grass person…), but the dainty little Brown’s lovegrass is just my ticket!
