Is Beardlip Penstemon deer resistant?

All the leaves sit in a clump at the bottom and all the interest is three feet up: slender scarlet tubes hanging in a long open cluster above sparsely leaved stems, June right through to October.

That gap is what people get wrong. At the front of a bed it reads as bare stalks with something red floating above them; pushed back behind low mounding plants that cover the base, it works. The other error is generosity. Rocky, unenriched, dry ground is what it is adapted to, and compost, feed or a moisture-holding mulch heaped round the crown works directly against the drainage it needs.

It is usually listed as a part-shade plant but takes full sun through the mountain west. Raise a few from seed each year — germination is best after a cold, moist spell — and a colony that renews itself will outlast any single plant.