As Mike mentioned in his post this weekend, we decided to try to plant some alternative groundcover in a few places in our yard. We already have some clovers that we seeded last year, but there’s one specific problem area where it’s a small, sloped strip of ground in between our fence and the sidewalk that’s difficult to mow and where we wanted to try something new. In addition to that, alternate groundcover should generally require less water and will provide some diversity in our yard. So with that in mind, we went to the local nursery and asked for suggestions.
I… may have gotten a little excited about the groundcover. To be fair, the person at the info desk was also really excited about groundcover, and pointed out several varieties that would do well in different locations in our yard. I wish I had taken a photo of the whole tray, but I ended up buying at least a dozen different plants. Some vinca, three varieties of thyme, a mossy thing, and another strawberry plant.
Vinca
We got two varieties of vinca – a purple one that does well in sunny areas and a white one that does well in shady areas. We went for evergreen varieties so they won’t die off in the winter. The purple one – ‘Bowles’s Variety’ also called Creeping Myrtle – ended up going on the slope next to the fence, which gets direct sunlight for most of the day.
Apparently vinca can grow quite aggressively and is considered invasive in some parts of the country. It’s not listed on the invasive plants list here (and I’d hope the local nursery would not be selling them if it was!), so we are looking forward to it’s aggressive takeover of this slope.
Here’s a look at the three plants before I mulched around them.
Not pictured is the before photo of what the sloped area looked like before I manually pulled out all of the various weeds that had been growing there. :p I ended up putting some mulch down around the vinca so it could get established without competition, and I’d like to also eventually pull out the rest of the vegetation near the sidewalk. But that’s for another day…
After planting the purple vinca on the slope, I had two plants remaining, which I put next to our house in a sunny spot, close to the blueberries.
And then it was time for the white vinca, also known as White Periwinkle, which likes shadier spots. I planted it on the other side of the fence line and also in a shady spot by our unused firepit.
On this side of the fence, I decided not to mulch around it at all. I like the idea of it competing with the clover. In the ideal scenario, we wouldn’t need to maintain the vinca once it’s established, so other than giving it some extra water for a little bit, we’ll just see how it does in these locations.
I used to have some corsican sandwort growing in this exact spot by the firepit, but I decided to move it and the other two that were by our shed to shadier locations, since they prefer full shade.
Here’s a look at one of them in its new home.
It’s still probably getting too much sunlight here, but less than before. We’ll see how it does in this spot and then move it to the front yard (which is nearly full shade all day) if it doesn’t seem happy here.
Thyme
Another alternative groundcover that likes sunny locations is thyme! I ended up getting three different varieties to try out in a very sunny location on the side of our house. We got Pink Chintz, Elfin, and Wooly varieties.
The wooly one is my favorite! It really feels wooly. But the other two look like they’ll have pretty flowers eventually, which would be fun. Here’s a look at two of them on the side of the house, with some mulch around them.
This side of the house is very sparsely populated with grass, weeds, and clovers, so I’m hoping the thyme will spread happily here. I wish I’d gotten more, but perhaps we’ll go back to the nursery soon… :3
Moss & Moss-like Plants
Other than the thyme and vinca, we’re also encouraging moss to grow in shadier spots in our yard. In the photo of the firepit in the vinca section, you can see some growing on the firepit. We also have some volunteer moss in several areas, especially in the front yard.
Given that we live in the rainy Pacific Northwest, there’s not much we need to do to encourage the moss. It’s more like, we just need to let it be and it seems to do its own thing.
But I also found a fun little plant at the nursery to add to the collection! It’s not really a moss. It’s called Scleranthus biflorus or a cushion bush, and it looks like moss, but it likes sunny locations.
I planted it in the sunny spot next to the shed where the corsican sandwort used to live. Although the corsican sandwort seemed really unhappy in this location, I think the Scleranthus biflorus will really like it.
More… strawberries?!
As Mike also hinted at in his previous post, I may have also gotten another strawberry plant…. ^^;;
In my defense, this is more of a “wild” variety. It’s called a Beach strawberry and will apparently make for good groundcover. It already looks like it’s ready to spread to new territory, so I’m excited to see what happens with it. And who doesn’t want more strawberries, really?
So that “covers” the groundcover for today… :3 We’ve had a few other fun surprises pop up around the yard over the past week or so, but I think this post is quite long enough. So I’ll do another post later this week corralling all of the random flowers and other plants that popped up all on their own! 😀 Thanks for reading!