This is the time of year one dreams of putting the hose and garden to bed.

Colors will be changing and interest fading fast shortly. But there are plenty of cool plants with great fall color as well as providing year-round interest.

Here are a few you should consider having in your own landscape.

American Cranberry

“We just bought a viburnum trilobum, said Marcia Swanson, president of Linn County Master Gardeners. “It has red berries and the foliage is turning bright red right now. Birds love it and the stems will look nice against the fence this winter.”

American Cranberry Viburnum is a large deciduous shrub, 8-to-12 feet tall and native to Oregon. It makes a great filler — back in the border. Leaves are 3-lobed (thus the name trilobum), with fall color ranging from yellow to red-purple. This plant has flat-topped white flower clusters in spring and scarlet red berries (resembles cranberries, thus the name) in early fall.

It prefers sun to part shade with well-drained but moist soil. For the best fall color, however, don’t over water this time of year as stress brings out their brilliant color.

You can see one up close on the Oregon State University campus in the northeast corner of a parking lot across from McNary dorm on Jefferson in Corvallis. They water this one, so it is still very green with red fruit.

Mimosa or silk tree

“Mimosas (Albizia julibrissin) are a great summer into fall flowering tree with unique foliage and soft pink flowers. Drawbacks — they are messy when fruit pods fall but do well back in the border,” said Barb Fick, OSU Linn and Benton County Master Gardener coordinator.

I have a wonderful Summer Chocolate mimosa in my children’s garden. Its leaves emerge green (slowly — to the point I wonder if it actually made it through winter or not) then turn dark red and by summer it is an amazing reddish-bronze or brown — thus the name summer chocolate.

The OSU Web site http://oregonstate.edu/dept/ldplants/common.htm tells us this is a deciduous tree measuring 20 feet tall and 15 feet wide, with a vase-shaped domed crown. The mimosa prefers either sun or part shade.

Variety E.H. Wilson is much more winter hardy than the Chinese silk trees. It is a graceful medium-sized tree.

Crape Myrtle

If you love hot spots in the garden, plant a crape myrtle. Spelled either crape or crepe (Lagerstroemia) is grown as a large shrub or small tree — depending on how you prune it. Many short compact varieties are also now available.

This is an excellent plant for summer color plus foliage colors in the fall. Crape myrtles bloom from July until frost. Blooms are typically rose to purple to white (mine is hot pink) and hang in panicle clusters, much like a lilac. Crinkly and delicate, blooms remind one of crepe paper, thus the name. Peeling bark provides great winter interest as well.

“Get plants with Indian sounding names as they are not as susceptible to powdery mildew,” Fick said.

Chinese dogwood

The best flowering dogwood for our area is the Cornus kousa or Chinese dogwood. It is the most disease resistant from leaf spots and anthracnose. Another bonus is that it flowers later than native dogwoods — a good two to three weeks after C. florida.

This deciduous tree grows at a moderate pace, likes sun to part shade and well-drained soil. It may reach 20 to 30 feet in height and 15 to 20 feet in width. Its small dark green leaves turn reddish purple to scarlet in fall.

Spring flowers are actually tapered white bracts. It has fun, knobby, pinkish red to red fruit in late summer followed by vibrant red/orange foliage, making it a superb small flowering tree for three seasons of interest!

Peanut butter tree

How would you like the smell of peanuts wafting through the air in your garden? You can with the Harlequin Glorybower or Peanut Butter Tree (Clerodendrum trichotomum).

The leaves give off a delicious smell when rubbed or crushed. It flowers in August through September with a wonderful fragrance. The fruit is spectacular. It’s a very coarse textured tree in the winter landscape after the leaves fall off.

These trees grows 10 to 20 feet tall, like sun to part shade and are said to grow best in a deep, yet light, well-drained soil.

Drawbacks: May freeze back in cold winters and it does send up root suckers so you must be diligent about removing them.

Advantage: Showy red calyxes cover small, and eventually, bright blue fruit. Very cool!

This plant can be seen on the Oregon State University campus, east side of the Women’s Center.

Himalayan honeysuckle or Pheasant Berry

My neighbor, Nona Tilton, gave me a start of her Himalayan honeysuckle (Leycesteria formosa) this spring. It is a semi-evergreen, thicket-forming shrub that attracts hummingbirds. New shoots are bamboo-like and the leaves are blue green in color. Purple and white flowers hang from attractive pendulous whorls. Bracts (resembling leaves — much like a poinsettia) are wine red. I like it for its beadlike fruit that starts out sea green, turns maroon, and ends up almost black, ripening at different times for long-lasting color.

Bush poppy

Bush poppy (Dendromecon Harfordii) is new to my garden. It’s brilliant yellow melon-scented flowers love full sun and bloom for me from summer through fall. This shrub can get 6 feet tall and likes well-drained sites.

Autumn crocus

Fall wouldn’t be fall without masses of autumn crocus (Colchicum autumnale), also known as meadow saffron.

These bulbs are very easy to grow. I got mine from a neighbor, now deceased, so they are special to me and carry on his legacy. You plant the corms in the fall. They leaf out in the spring and die back in the summer. Then it “comes alive’ again in fall with stunning masses of mauve-purple speckled, goblet-shaped flowers — appearing out of those dried-up leaves. These bulbs multiply freely, but do not take over. Mine have been in the same spot nearly 20 years.