Guide To Growing Ground Covers
 (Read 250+ times)
By Glory Lennon
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The wonderful thing about ground covers is once planted they pretty much do things on their own. They literally have it covered leaving you, the gardener, time to do so many other things. The ground cover can provide a low maintenance landscape keeping weeds from invading, keeping the soil from quickly drying out so you won’t have to constantly water and they keep the soil together preventing erosion. With all this going for these plants it’s a wonder why more gardeners don’t take advantage of them to make life easier for them. Perhaps all you need is a useful guide to growing ground covers to get them started. Well, since you’ve asked here it is.
A ground cover can be any plants grown closely together to form a uniform mat to cover most if not all of the soil. This would make your lawn just as much a ground cover as a large patch of native daylilies covering a hillside and the prolific and nice smelling weed Crown Vetch filling the median along the highway. Lawns, however, are labor intensive unlike the easygoing ground cover. Native daylilies which grow upwards of 6 feet might be too tall to be called your usual ground cover though they work perfectly well as such. Crown Vetch, though pretty and nicely scented should be enjoyed from a distance. As it is particularly invasive it would not do for the well ordered landscape.
What most people consider true ground covers are low growing plants which spread quickly for complete coverage. There is a ground cover for every situation, wet soil, dry climate, too much or too little sun. The adventurous gardener should experiment with all sorts of plants to find unique ground covers for their landscape. The best are those with runner type roots which spread very rapidly or those like the Carpet Rose which provide a constant flower show up until frost.
For shade you might want the extremely likable Lily-Of-The-Valley (Convallaria Majalis), Periwinkle (Vince Minor) which comes alive with tons of starry blue blossoms in mid spring or Ajuga Reptans also bursting into bloom come spring with dark purple-blue 5 inch tall spikes. All of these grow profusely to the point of being a bit invasive if allowed free reign but they make the most solid ground cover for sloping banks in the deep shade.
These ground cover plants are often used around trees to cover protruding roots. That way there is no need to mow around them risking damage to the tree roots and also eliminating the need to weed-whack. Removing any weeds and grass in and around the tree roots is a must before planting the ground cover. Otherwise you’ll be on your knees weeding all the time, defeating the purpose of a carefree ground cover.
For the sunny location you might consider Blue Rug Juniper (Juniperus Horizontalis). This ground hugging shrub spreads to an incredible 5 square feet and looks especially lovely on a sunny hill planted in staggered rows for full, uniform coverage. For the ultimate in low-maintenance use a mulch of decorative stones and you’ll never have to lift a finger. Blue Festuca (Festuca Ovina Gluaca) is another good choice for full sun. These pretty powder blue puffball-like grass clumps make a unique ground cover especially good for the rock garden.
The point of a groundcover obviously is to cover the soil but planting the individual plants too closely together will not allow them room to grow making a crowded bed which will need thinning out in no time depending on how quickly your particular plants grow. Spacing them, therefore, with their growth rate in mind will give you a good base covering with still enough room for the plants to grow.
Be aware that thinning out will become necessary at some point and there are also the times when the ground cover will quite literally leap its bounds and grow in walkways, driveways, creep into other garden beds and even the lawn. You’ll simply have to weed them out. Providing a strong barrier set deep into the ground and extending over it can help them stay in place but with some ground covers like English Ivy with its voracious root system it might do nothing but hinder them for a little while. Nothing short of brutal pruning can curtail some ground covers.
The best way to find a ground cover with the right qualities for your application is to find a knowledgeable person well versed in ground covers. In other words someone who has already had the dubious pleasure of growing them therefore knowing what to expect. These people, better known as the garden buddy, are invaluable and every gardener should get one. Green Thumb Articles is full of them in case you didn’t know.
Hope this guide to growing ground covers helps in your search of the perfect one for your landscape. Once you get the hang of growing them you’ll wonder how you lived without them before.
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Author Bio Box: Glory Lennon
 For amusing short stories visit http://www.helium.com/users/32782. For an intriguing novelette-in-progress visit: http://www.myspace.com/glorygarden.
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