With so many gorgeous or unusual perennial plants that will grow and flower well in wet places in the garden, you can choose what colors or accents you want to enliven your landscaping with. These are some suggestions for less well-known water loving perennials that flower: Aconite Buttercup flowers in late spring through early summer; Alpine Speedwell and hybrids has blue flowers in the summer; Arend's Saxifrage has white, pink or red flowers in the spring; Byzantine Gladiolus flowering vigorously in the summer with colors that vary from lavender-red, maroon and copper; and Hairy Toad-lily flowers for a month in late summer through early Autumn.

Many perennials that flower can flourish in wet areas, even standing water, but some of these same plants can also do quite well in dry areas or places in the landscape with average moisture. Several native plants that deserves more use are: Cardinal Flower, whose deep red blooms attract hummingbirds for weeks in August and Hardy Ageratum brightens the fall garden with mature blue blooming.

Hybridization work with Verbena is giving us lacy leaves, a vast array of bloom colors and increased tolerance to growing in wetter spots in the garden. It is still best to use Verbena in areas that drain between waterings and lend themselves well to container gardening since both flowers and foliage is attractive. Perennial Verbenas come into flower early in the spring with white, light and dark pinks, blue, lavender-pink, purple, coral-pink, burgundy, cherry, hot pink and lavender-blue. 

To view learn more about perennials for wet conditions, please visit Virtual Plant Tags.