Try sprucetop grama, alkalai sacaton, giant sacaton, little bluestem. I planted these in winter of 2010, and they're all going strong. I water them by hand once a week if it hasn't rained. They're native too!

My favorite is the sprucetop grama; it's the first to green and the first to send up seed stalks. Little bluestem has nice winter color, kind of pink. None are invasive (I wish they were!). The giant sacaton will require a little extra water to look its best, but I still consider it xeric.

Interesting, I haven't heard of the Spruce top before. Is there anything you have tried, Juttah, that didn't do well? Specifically, I'm wondering about the Calamagrostis acutiflora 'Karl Foerster'. I wonder if it's as blue as they make it look on-line.

The only thing I *really* want to avoid (other than high water use) is those darn pom-poms of dead grass with a few greens stems poking out of them. I'm still seeing them trying to look good after the landscrapers sheared them last winter. Blek!

I'm afraid I don't have much experience with improved grasses; the only ones I've attempted were blue fescue (died) and Japanese silver grass (looked great for several years then declined).

I don't trust ANY too-good-to-be-true plant pictures, especially not the ones in the catalogs. (I call those "plant porn"!)

The dead woody pom-poms irritate me too, but I guess it's a necessary thing with the coarse giant grasses. That's another reason I prefer unimproved natives, you can just leave them be for fall/winter interest. Or even more fun - you can BURN them, hehe