Hello! My wife and I moved into out first house and are wondering wtf to do with this yard. My father in law paid for the first months of grass cutting, but the guy left all the trimmings on top and my yard is dead currently (we had huge patches of grass all around the yard, guessing it got smothered but I’m not sure). I am finally buying a sprinkler and have a decent mower and weed eater.
In the case where my grass doesnt grow back, could I just plant clover or another groundcover and be fine? I have been wanting to do a more natural clover/groundcover lawn, but scared too if the mowing cycles are off.
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Midwest Native Plant Society is a good resource for going with native plants.
Depending on the drainage in your yard some rain gardens or dry creek beds might be an idea for filling some of the bare patches.
Clover and walkable thyme (wooly and several other varieties out there would work) are good for walking areas. Clover is fairly easy to get started replacing grass: just overseed it in the fall, seed on top of the last snow of winter, and overseed again in the spring. I have 3 or 4 types of thyme in my yard that look great in their little spots but could easily be planted and allowed to spread into ground cover.
Sedum/stonecrop is great drought resistant ground cover that looks cool. If you have enough shade: consider moss for less trafficked areas.
I’ve used Sedum Tiles in several gardens around our yard and the walkway up to our house. They grown in well and will spread out well.
I’ll try to remember to take some pictures when I get home.
Thank you. It sounds beautiful and what I was picturing in my head. Pics please to show the wife so we can start planning a fall seeding!
This started as sedum tiles 2 years ago and has filled in and spread out well.
I’ve been keeping a strip cleared to let moss and sedum spread.
My moss garden. It started as a volunteer patch 2 springs ago and I’ve just been keeping it clear. The red and brown on top the moss are spent sporacles. The red sedum split off from the tile nearby which is one of the things I lile about them: they have a variety of colors and shapes to start but I never know which ones will thrive. In the back is silvermound which is a great low growing perrenial with incredibly soft foliage. It smells nice, too.
Thyme, this was a transplant from another patch and started as just a couple stalks in a crevasse. Behind and to the left is a ninbark bush; fast growing, purple-red leaves, with pink or white flowers in the spring. Behind and to the right is a bunchalotta purslane I’ve been halfheartedly weeding; it’s basically a harmless volunteer but spreads so easily I have to keep it in check lest it overwhelm its neighbors. You can also see some sedum I put in the spaces between stones; another perk of the tiles is you can cut them with scissors to fit wherever you need.
Another type of thyme with more varietes of sedum around it and some Irish moss to the left. Same purslane in the back.
Yet more thyme. This was planted last spring and has gone wild wherever it can.
Wooly thyme! This is one of the types I see recommended as walkable. It gets teeny tiny pink flowers in the spring.
Hylotelephium telephium, a type of stonecrop (sedum) plantes by itself (not from a garden tile).
Do you have the thyme? To listen to me whine…
This patch started from a single starter pod from the local nursery last year and has spread itself out well. Water meter for scale. :) Also the patch I took some from for the first thyme picture.
Another cool thing about sedum is you can pretty mich stick it on a rock and it will grow.
Sedum and a hens and chicks succulent on another rock.
Another picture of the hens and chicks. I wanted to show another view because we’ve never seen hens and chicks grow a stalk and flower like this.
You can also see some bugleweed in the lower right. Bugleweed is another spreading ground cover with some varieties to choose from.
Oh yeah, we’re in Missouri, hardiness zone 6b so all these plants can take 100+ F in the summer and -10 F or more winters.
I don’t have personal experience with it but buffalo grass is another no mow solution I’ve looked into when plotting the demise of my monoculture lawn.
My lawn has grass, clover, and violets, with a few other random plants. The violets are great and look nice and don’t really need mowing. The clover and grass eventually require mowing, but not moreso than just pure grass.
Do you happen to know which type of grass and clover you have? A neighbor just cut back their natural lawn and it looks so good. I’m sure it will take a few cycles to get a decent yawn
Not sure what type of grass, it was there when we moved in. White clover
There’s low growing clover varieties IMHO, and clover has proven to be much more drought resistant here (Germany) than grass. It also improves the soil quality.
Dutch (white) clover is a pretty popular, drought resistant, and low-growing type. Good point about clover improving the soil! It’s a nitrogen fixing plant.
It also improves the soil quality.
If your referencing it’s nitrogen fixing capabilities, I believe the clover has to die for it to be available to other plants.
All said, out of all the plants you could have in your lawn, clover is a good one!
According to Wikipedia they do some magic in their roots, while living: “As legumes, clovers fix nitrogen using symbiotic bacteria in their root nodules, and are used as an alternative or supplement to synthetic nitrogen fertilizers.”
Right, but as far as I know, that nitrogen isn’t bio-available to other plants until the clover dies. The nitrogen is produced, just not usable.
Ah yes, understood. Well, it will be a nice ground cover until that time comes.
Will need to look into more clover types. Just worried i will need to cut the lawn down a tad before they fully grow
Clover works well just north of the Midwest. I have a field covered by a nice low mat of knotgrass near me, too, which is interesting.
If you’re in an HOA, check the bylaws before replacing with clover.
Having said that, depending on where you’re at, clover can work incredibly well. A couple years ago, I changed the layout of my yard - moved flower beds and such. I put down clover in the areas where the beds used to be and it’s taken over a significant portion of my lawn. It’s great. I don’t have to mow as often and my lawn looks nice.
I get a ton of bees in the yard now too; which are fun to watch. I sware my vegetable garden has much better yield since doing it too. I thank the bees, but a friend of mine insists it’s just my imagination.
Regardless, I’m in the midwest and clover has grown well with very little maintenance. Of course, your milage may vary.
Great point about the HOA. You might be able to skirt them by planting native grasses/flowers/ground covers.
Do you use your yard? Or is it primarily just to look at?
Mainly just to look at. We have a tiny dog who likes running but that is it
I don’t think it will be too much of a problem then, but some broadleaf ground covers don’t tolerate foot traffic too well.
I had a section of my lawn that was wild violet, and the second it got wet and walked on it was a mud pit! My 15 pound dog was tracking foot prints all over our house so it had to go!
Dang need to keep an eye out then. My dog is 15 pounds and loves her outside time.
I don’t have any personal experience with clover, but I would bet it has better traffic tolerance than wild violet.
When I was looking into alternatives to grass, I was considering micro-clover, but in the end I settled on good old grass.
When taken care of correctly, I could get away with mowing about once a week on average. This was with no watering and minimal fertilizing. And I still had people stop on the sidewalk to complement it.
