On the north side of my house I have an area I would like to plant with a nice ground cover so we don't have to mow. Not much of anything grows there except weeds. It is full shade.
I think I would like some kind of ivy but I'm open to any suggestions. I would like it to be fast spreading but not so fast it invades the back, front or neighbor's yard.
My husband thought the variegated potato vine would be nice, but I had to tell him it is an annual.
Thanks so much for any input.
Pam
Need recommendation for a zone 5/6 perennial ground cover.
I think pachysandra, lamium, and ajuga may be options for you. Other than that, I do not know. I have little shade in my yard and I am unfamiliar with the best ground covers. Ivy would definitely fill in, but I think it would meander a bit into the other sections of the lawn. Have you searched any websites? You might try bluestone perennials you can do a custom search.
I really like the lamium but I have had some there for a couple years & it isn't doing anything. Barely spreading at all. It may be because the ground is clay. I think maybe if I amend the soil a lot maybe it would do better.
Is there an ajuga that does well in shade? I have a patch in one of my beds, but it hasn't spread much in about 4-5 years. Maybe it would like shade better.
I have very little shade in my yard, too. I rarely even look at anything that's not for blazing hot sun. : )
I did look at some websites, but really wanted input from someone who had something that was doing what I'm trying to do.
Oh, I just looked at the pachysandra & found a groundcover website. They also have ajuga & says it likes shade.
Thanks so much!
Pam
In case anyone else is interested the website is:
http://classygroundcovers.com
If you look in the DG classifieds, they often have a discount for us!
Sweet woodruff? I love mine, and it does well in shade, although my shade sounds like it might be brighter than yours. But check it out:
http://www.sover.net/~garden/Woodruff.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodruff
If you want something that is really tough , purple wintercreeper. Mine does great in shade and I can trim it to fit whenever it gets close to the edges.
I've loved sweet woodruff every time I see it - I just don't have a good spot in my yard to put it.
I have to second sweet woodruff. I love how it looks and how it smells.
There's also vinca, which comes in a variegated form. This stuff can potentially spread like wildfire, but I haven't had a problem containing mine so far and I do like the look of it.
I'm wondering if anything that spreads quickly and readily is going to have a tendency to be invasive, though. My sweet woodruff is contained by a rock border and so is my vinca. I really have no idea where it would wander off to if it wasn't.
Another thought...
You said you wanted something ivy-like, but have you considered some sort of ornamental grass? I really like my liriope. I have liriope muscari, which spreads but hasn't seemed to spread very quickly for me. I treat it as a garden plant and not a ground cover. But liriope spicata, shown below, might just do the trick for you.
http://classygroundcovers.com/item--Liriope-spicata-%7B50-Bare-Root-plants%7D-Creeping-Lily-Turf--365
Yeah, Ivy is out...or come here and get all you want for free. I spent all of last Sunday cleaning out just one year's growth and had 2 giagantic garbage bags full. There is still a lot more, first come, ALL served! The trouble is, it will fill in fast and grow in the absence of light. It has to be thinned, trimmed, cut, and mowed (March) to keep it in line, but even doing all that, it will still take over the world. Sorry, but I cannot recommend it at all. Check the Invasives forum if you are even tempted!
I like the look of several things -- Ajuga is an actual ground hugging ground cover with a 10" spike of colored flowers in early May, usually blue. These spikes elongate, grow leaves, bend over, root, and that's how it multiplies. It comes in a bunch of different leaf colors. It forms a mat, so if you have a ton of deciduous leaves there in fall, you have to be careful with the rake. It requires no watering in summer, but does require relief from the western afternoon sun. It doesn't really grow in shade very well IMHO.
I have a single Lamium I bought in about 1983 that has covered my whole woods and has intruded to the neighbors'. It can out-compete English Ivy by growing over the top of it. Unfortunately, it can also get out of hand. *if* you go this route, don't just choose one you think is pretty, ask around and see which is the most invasive and stay away from those!
Wintergreen/Teaberry is nice looking and nice smelling, like Teaberry Gum, are you old enough to remember that? There is a pancake house here that has a little brick courtyard and it is edged in wide swathes of wintergreen. Nice looking year round. http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/1101/ If you look at the trade list for this one, an awful lot of people would like to have it. This one actually can take full shade, but it also requires acid soil, so unless you have pine trees, or needled evergreens that have been dropping needles for a decade, skip it in Missouri.
The euonymous coloratus is nice year round, especially if you mow it. The trouble is, you can't probably use your lawn mower. It has to have a raised blade and you need to rent a bush mower or have it done for you. (Exxpensive?) We have done it ourselves with an electric hedge clipper, slow going, and it's a 2-person job one to clip and one to pick up the clippings. We only did it once because it was so labor intensive! You only get the red color if it has sun, or at least sun in the fall/winter. This can be a fast filler-inner, which also means it can outstay and outgrow its welcome. It can also (will also) climb trees. NOT good (unless it is in full shade, then it doesn't grow nearly as tall or as fast).
Pachysandra comes in miniature, regular and variegated. The regular is the cheapest. Evergreen, it does spread eventually. Buy it (or any ground cover) in bulk by pieces and plant it real close together then mulch it. It needs light, but not sun, good moisture retentive soil, and friable soil. It will swallow all the deciduous leaves that fall on it. I bought 500 plugs of this and planted it in a bed I had mulched for a couple years straight with about 6" of rotted horse manure. If you plant it close enough, you can get away with growing it in nearly full sun, as long as that soil is woodland-quality with some nitrogenous compost or rotted horse manure. I have quite a stand of it now. I would say it likes "high shade".
Vinca minor is probably the best all around. You can buy plugs. My husband and I did a huge area in about 1981. The plugs were dead for all practical purposes, but the company said to plant it, so we did. We were laughing at ourselves because we spent so long planting 1000 plugs, but baby, it grew! You can take old fashioned hairpins and train it to cover where you want it to go. It will do better with some sun, can grow in full sun, and also full shade, but won't have the periwinkle blue flowers in early May in full shade.
I suppose you don't want plants that go dormant: violets, or ferns, but some ferns stay more or less evergreen. There is also Lily of the Valley and variegated LOV. They are going now and can also compete with English Ivy. They go dormant in winter, too. I don't love sweet woodruff, and it's not evergreen.
All in all I vote: Wintergreen, then Vinca minor, then pachysandra. All of them can get 10"+ tall.
That's my take on it..
Suzy
One of my favorite plants, Evergreen Solomon's Seal - Disporopsis perneyi http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/37100/ would work in your situation. It may be a little taller than you're looking for, about 8"-12", but it will quickly form a carpet of glossy green foliage. PF says it's only hardy to Zone 7, but it has survived our Zone 6 winters for over 5 years. The evergreen foliage sometimes looks a little shabby by late winter and some years I cut it back hard before the new growth appears. Most years I don't have the time and just leave it and by late spring the glossy new growth quickly covers the old foliage.
Thank you all for some beautiful choices, most of them I haven't ever looked into & don't know anything about since most of my yard is full sun.
The sweet woodruff is nice but it looks like it would be a little taller than I had in mind.
I like the purple wintercreeper and think that would be nice.
I like the variegated vinca, but my mom has it & I am definitely not interested in trying to keep it contained. She's always having to pull it out of everything. Too bad, because I could get all I wanted from her.
KaylyRed, I think you're right, anything that has the qualities I'm looking for, is also going to have invasive tendencies. The liriope is pretty but a little too grassy. : )
Illoquin, thanks for the heads up on the ivy. I kind of thought that. I still think it looks nice, but would rather not spend my time pulling stuff out all the time. I like the ajuga, too. I have some of the multicolor in one of my beds, but it hasn't spread very far. I wish it would do well in shade.
Yes, I remember Teaberry gum! I love that smell. I'm sure my husband would appreciate that, too.
Looks like I might try the euonymous coloratus, purple wintercreeper.
I'm tired of thinking about it tonight. I think I'll sleep on it.
Thanks again.
Pam
I have been reading this thread with great interest because I have Prism exact delima. I had a few Vinca in the location and they are blooming now. However, they seem to be takine a very long time to cover the surface. The soil in the area is very poor. Any suggestion as to how many plants I would need to cover an area of 15 feet long and 4 feet wide??
RWB, I'm not sure how many plants, because it depends on the size you buy in the first place. To cover a large area, I thin kyou are better off getting the small plugs and plantig them closer. Better than getting bigger plants and planting them farther apart, I mean.
We had a 48 " wide area, but it was probably 80 or 100 feet long, and then there was a more triangular area, and an area up by the house. We boght 100 plugs, but I don't remember what % of plugs went where, or even how big the original triangle and area up by the house were. Everything's been changed several times since them. :)
The 48" wide path we did was mowed, cut with a sod cutter, the sod was turned over and planted. Then it was all covered with a combination of compost and grass clippings...a little like lasagne layering. I bought 1000 plugs from here: http://www.musserforests.com/prod.asp?p=MYR
They might have a "how many plants? square footage" calculator.
I think I said the plugs were dead when we planted them, but they still grew. I realized I had planted the plugs right next to the path I made, so it was a constant struggle to keep it trimmed back even with the side of the path. I guess I am tyring to tell you not to do what I did.
Illoquin thank you for the feedback. After much consideration and thought I think I will put landscape fabric there and mulch. This area is at the edge of my proprety, which is also a small creek. Along side are all these wild bushes and I wanted to do something underneath them so it looks a little bit more tidy when looking down form my deck (the back of my proprety slops into this wild creek area). On front of the bushes a have a 15+ foot row of Siberian iris and once they come up you cannot really see behind there anyway. It just would be really pritty in the spring - an ocean of blue little flowers underneath the bushes waiting to leaf out! I have so many garden projects and will put this one on hold until a year or two. After all... the saying goes "Rome was not build in one day" As yound and inexperienced gardener I am learning this the hard way - exhaustion is hitting me!
Okay. Sounds good.
Have you thought about using cardboard instead of landscape fabric? It's cheaper, will kill anything you put it over, will kill weeds, grass, and perennial weeds and prevent them from coming up, and will give you a really good start if you/when you decide to plant it.
If you use it, you can end up with this later:
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/649906/
If you know it will be 2 or more years, use a double layer of corrugated cardboard. The mulch will hide it all.
Suzy
Empty pizza boxes - every time we recycle one, I'm thinking "there goes another lasagna bed we're NOT making . . . . "