Has anyone used clover as grouncover in a flower bed? I would like to get the nutrients from the clover but don't have much experience with it, other than it is often considered a weed; I'm hesitant to plant anything that would just take over and become a problem. The lovely color and contrast qualities would be an added bonus to the nutrients. Any thoughts?
What kind of clover are you interested in planting? The trick with a cover crop is to let it grow, usually till first bloom and then turn it under. I've had good luck with crimson clover here. And buckwheat is one of my favorites for weed smother. You got to turn it before it sets seed as it is a self sower. And once it blooms I highly recommend turning it in at dusk, since the honeybees get really unhappy about some person mowing down their food source. LOL
lol, I'll keep that bee tip in mind!
Oh, the pic is Trifolium repens 'dark dancer.' It would be in a rather small bed along with a Miss Kim Lilac, Hinoki False Cypress, Clematis, and a few clumps of yellow daylilies. I have some purple queen in there right now but don't like it in that small space--didn't realize how rampant it can be.
Another concern is if it'll spread over the border bricks into the turf. I wouldn't mind so much, but it is very close to the neighbor's property, less than 3 feet away; so I want to be considerate of that too.
Here's an early summer pic of the bed. I have since taken out the small false cyress, moved the lilac forward, and put a clematis at the base of the downspout. Those border bricks are the scalloped type, but I put them in upside down for ease in mowing; so they're almost flush with the turf.
OMG, I love the trifolium, yummy, yummy. And sorry, I didn't mean to steer you wrong, I read cover crop, not ground cover. blushing..Normally clovers are associated with cover crops as they are such great nitrogen fixers. They can be invasive which may create more problems for you. Are you looking to use this as a living mulch? If so, I'd suggest using one these : Artemisia, vinca, veronica or one of the low growing yarrows.
ah ha...that's what I suspected, invasive. Oh well, I'll just continue enjoying it in a planter.
And yes, I guess a living mulch (new term for me) is what I'm aiming for. I love artemisia and veronica both and didn't even know there were low growing yarrows. I'll research those alternatives.
Thank you much, doccat, for the great advice!
hi plantmover- ( like the name, sometimes moving plants seems to be the be all and end all of my gardening!) I like those scalloped bricks much better as you have them than right side up.
Respectufully taking a grain of salt to doccats recommendation. That clover is really pretty! Let's think about how it would be invasive. I doubt it would be spreading seeds, but if I'm wrong and it would seed out in the grass, then I agree , don't use it. But I think it would be creeping out runners over the edge and ends. If you can live with some trimming back, I would say OK. Clover is so tender and small, not in the same invasive category as, say,.............garlic chives or spearmint. But I think the ones doccat named would stay in clumps and not run like the clover. So, send ME the clover for test purposes and I'll report back (he he)
lol-thanks for making me feel normal, sallyg! My DH is convinced that moving plants is really all it means to be a gardener.
I do love it, but further research has me even more convinced that I shouldn't put it in the ground...terms like 'very aggressive' and 'indefinite' spread are intimidating. As much as I'd like to, I just don't have enough real estate to give it that kind of freedom...*sigh*...a pot it is. However, if you can tell how to take a start, I'll send you some to 'test'. My guess is I could cut a section out, mail it, and it'd survive well enough to spread wherever your heart desires. :)
This message was edited Nov 30, 2007 2:41 PM
Hey, hey sallyg, you dis me, gurl? I ain't gonna dive in no dumpsters with you, if you gonna act that way...........ROFLMAO... Just ignore her, plantmover, she's a sweet person, but a yankee, you know how it is.........LOL Just teasing!
roflol...I'm a yankee myself--too funny! Born and raised in PA but haven't lived north of the mason-dixon line in decades. It's all good, doccat! ;)
IMH experience.....that stuff'll spread all over the place! If you want it in your bed, be sure to plant it in your lawn. It'll be in the bed the next week.
Which is why it makes lovely cover crop rather than ground cover. Great nitrogen fixer and the bees love it.
hey pm, I agree that very invasive and indefinite sound baaad. Now doccat has me skeered and I am siding back with her! I'll work on my trade list and maybe you'll see something interesting. Wait for spring though!
If you want it in your bed, be sure to plant it in your lawn. It'll be in the bed the next week. ha ha, too true!!
us poor Marylanders, can never figure out if we're northern or southern.
"Best of both worlds," heh.
I only dumpster dive with a those of a higher social order, of course..............winks LOL
Too true, pcat, too true...can't make these plants behave for nothing! :)
I'm looking forward to trading, sallyg; sounds like great fun. And apparently, I'm missing out on some kind of fun in the 'dumpster diving'--do tell more, doccat!
Glad I found this thread. Have been playing with the Idea of using white clover (Trifolium repens) as a ground cover/ cover crop for a while. In the vegetable garden, and around larger plants. For its nitrogen fixing capabilities.
My friend Igor got me onto it, hes a plant geneticist (also a gardener) and did his phD on White clover. He seems to think its a great idea. He said it doesnt matter if it keeps coming back, even after being dug under. It would help suffocate out the other weeds. Plus it doesnt actually get that tall, so could quite happily live undernesth a crop of tomatoes/ brocoli/ peppers etc. Kind of like a living mulch.
He has offered to get me the seeds. But, as most of you will know, the nitrogen fixing is a reaction to a bacteria present in most soils, and occurs in the little root nodules called rhizobia. If the bacteria is not present, infection cant occur, so neither can nitrogen fixation.
His advice to ensure the bacteria is in your garden: dig up some mature clover plants (from the lawn or wherever you can find them) which ARE showing the rhizobia on their roots, grind them up, add to a full watering can, and water the newly sprouted clover bed with this. This will introduce a bacterial "starter".
It takes a little while for the clover to add significant amounts of nitrogen to the soil, so a setup that allows the plants to mature would be ideal. I am planning to do a trial around the base of some fruit trees. A winter cover crop will be next. Possibly not even digging much, just planting amongst it in spring.
Hope this helps. Lena
Oh my, oh my, that's wonderful information Lena. I didn't realize you could use clover in that way. Give that guy a hug!!
Yes, hes a very handy friend to have :-)
oooooo - that's not going to go over well up here. White clover is EVERYWHERE, and hard to get rid of.
Crimson clover makes a great cover crop for me, is non-invasive & minds its manners while growing around other crops. Pretty flower, too.
Lena, can you give me a quick idea of what a rhizobia looks like?
Very small round bulges on the roots, like little cysts. About quarter the size of a grain of rice, or smaller even. Same colour as the roots. And quite fragile Ive found. The plant needs to be very carefully extracted from the soil if you want to see the rhizobia still attached. They tend to fall off quite easily.
Once you have seen them though, you know the bacteria is present in the surrounding soil and plants. I will ask Igor again to make sure, but the impression I got, was that the whole plant/ soil area could be used to add the bacterium to your new clover patch.
Lena
For once the web has failed me, Confusing pages of copy right laws etc. So I turned to one of my old university text books from 2nd year (Biology of Plants, by Raven et al, 1999, 6e). This is (brief and english version of) what I found on my journey down a very vague memory lane:
Nitrogen is lost from the soil by an anaerobic process where it denatures to volatile forms and returns to the atmosphere as gas. Also through the removal (harvesting) of plants, errosion, burning and leaching etc etc.
Main way to get N into soil is N fixation. Atmospheric N2 is reduced to NH4+ and made available to carbon containing compounds to produce amino acids.... skip... N fixation, which can be carried out only by certain bacteria, is a process on which all living organisms are dependant.
N-fixing bacteria can be classified as free living, or symbiotic with certain vascular plants. Symbioyic are most important, in terms of amunts of N fixed. (I hope im getting somewhere with all this, that was a whole text book page by the way) Most common are Rhizobium (aHA!) and Bradyrhyzobium, both of wich live on the roots of legumes.
A crop of alfalfa that is plowed back into the soil may add up to 350kg of nitrogen per hectare of soil!
Nodules are produced by the host plant upon infection by bacteria (rhizobium) which enter the root hairs of young seedlings. Begins with an attachment of bacterium to the emerging root hairs (sounds like plants need to be young). Infected emerging root hairs typically develope into tightly curled structures, entrapping the rhizobia. Infection threads let the bacteria penetrate underlying cortical cells...(skip)... cell division... makes the tumor like growth that is the nodule.
Something about needing oxygen for the nitrogenase to do its fixing, using leghemoglobin...(skip)
Relationship is very specific between bacterium and host plant. Meaning clover rhizobium bacteria will only infect clover.
Then it moves on to non-legumous hosts, and non-symbiotic N-fixing bacteria.
Wow. I just learnt something. Thought Id share it :-)
Lena
good thread--please keep it going--these ideas are interesting but not easy to sort out.
For instance, clover is invasive (OK, but so is lawn grass, which is a labor-intensive nuisance and boring waste of good earth)
Another for instance, I want nitrogen-fixing plants, but my old back does not like to dig any more than necessary. Isn't there any way to figure out if roots are inoculated with the needed bacteria--besides looking for nodules on roots? There are organic products that I've read about that can be added (from a full and upright position, back-wise) to the surface that will work down into the root area. Has anyone tried any of these things?
Another goal of mine is to disturb the soil as little as possible. Instead of tilling cover crops into the soil, can't you just chop them down and let them compost in place? or cover them with more organic matter?
Whenever I plant a new tree or shrub, I always get a small shovelful of leaf mold from under oak trees. I put the duff into the planting hole hoping that some mycorhhiza, etc. on the leaves will refresh life in my degraded soil. Otherwise, I don't add anything to the native soil when I transplant.
Maypop, there not reason you can not set it up so you do not have to till or dig. It depends on the cover crop,but many can be chopped down and plant directly. You can use compost tea, sprayed on your beds, etc.
Please read thru some of the soil composting threads for advice on making compost, verimcomposting, composting teas. Lots of good information and great ideas for those of us who organically. There are also some threads on no-till practices as well.
We do use a tiller, but only do wide row beds, so it makes it a piece of cake to work the garden.
doccat, I do compost now, but I usually just put kitchen scraps, raked leaves, etc. directly into or onto gardens rather than waste their strength with decomposition. Haven't done compost tea but hear that it is very effective.
My husband and I have a friendly competition--he tills a garden and grows conventionally. I have small beds that are organic, using lasagna methods, heritage vegetables, narrow enough that I can reach everything and don't waste space on compacted walk rows.
So the next thing I need to do is use cover crops like clover. I made the mistake of planting vinca years ago and continue to pull it up constantly, would much rather have clover roaming around.
You might consider buckwheat. It has hollow stems so you can mow it down. You need to get it right after it flowers, because it will reseed. I do recommend you do your mowing at dusk, the honey bees get really p--sed when you take away their buckwheat.
We use both tiller and lasanga methods. We do wide row, slightly raised beds. It's easy with the Troybult and I can use it easily. Periodically I take the Troy thru the walkways, it helps turn up any stray weed seeds and throws a fine mist of dirt on the veggies which helps conserve moisture.
We have little problem with compaction, since we move the garden area regularly.
We have been growing organically for over 25 years and this is the 2nd Troy we've owned. My only problem is getting DH to stop! I do not want a half acre veggie garden anymore.......LOL Boys and their toys I guess.
I went looking for a picture of rhizobia and found one with an interesting article as well.
David
http://overton.tamu.edu/clover/cool/nfix.htm
Great article David, thankyou.
Lena
plantmover asked, "Has anyone used clover as grouncover in a flower bed?"
The first posting in this thread is one that all gardeners should consider, although almost all (or all?) the information relates more to farmers and ranchers.
davidmk's link is one of the best I've seen and poses some more problems--like how clover and other legumes are soil specific. That means that picking the right seed and inoculant is not as easy as buying seeds of vegetables and flowers (oops, that's not always so easy either).
I started too late this year to do any legume planting in my new beds and am still waiting for some lasagna beds to rot a bit more. Another problem I have is the wildlife population that is stressed by all the doggone pine plantations around here that gobble up all the native habitat. The deer, coons, etc. eat up pretty much everything we grow, since not much grows under the rows of loblolly pines. They especially love peas and other legumes and have knocked down fences and electric wires to get into the big garden.
I don't blame the critters though. It's people who have spoiled the land for.so many years. The local county agents still recommend synthetic fertilizers and conventional methods. I hope the next generation of Cooperative Extension will be more aware of sustainable tactics like using legumes.
