I'm in Georgetown (north of Austin) and am looking for a good, no-fuss, evergreen ground cover to use as filler between my tree and shrub border. Preferably under 6 inches. It would have to be able to take full sun since all my trees and shrubs are small. I am leaning strongly towards creeping thyme, because I like the look and it can take foot traffic which is important, but am concerned that it won't care for my clay soil. I know confederate jasmine and vinca minor are possibilities, although if I can find something less vine-like, I'd prefer it. I suppose the new sun-tolerant mondo grass might work as well. Anyway, I'd love to hear some suggestions or if anyone has had luck with creeping thyme in this part of the country.
Thanks!
Noel
Good (and easy) ground cover for Texas
asian jasmine, all green, variegated variety and there is a brand new one that has yellow and red leaves. saw it at home depot.
Asian Jasmine is so aggressive! It's a maintenance nightmare. If you like to spend most of your weekends weed-eating, get some. The builders had put alot of it here and last year I finishing pulling it all out by hand.
I have to agree... Asian Jasmine isn't the best way to go unless you want to work a lot to keep it looking good
The new asian jasmine cultivar is Salsa. It's very pretty with yellow, red gold and bronze leaves. More yellow than anything else, but I don't know if it's as invasive as the regular one. I've never had much luck with thyme. I've planted it several time, even in improved soil, but the heat kills it every time. I have heart leaf ice plant under my oleanders and it fits your requirements. I've not had a problem with it being invasive and it's very easy to grow with small hot pink blooms. You can literally just drop it on top of the soil and it takes off. I also have some variegated ardisia and some Tricolor sweet potato vine. The potato hasn't made it through the winter yet, so don't know how that'll work. The ardisia is very tough, drought tolerant, prefers shade, has small pink flowers followed by berries. It spreads by underground runners and does tend to spread, but not too rapidly. It has wintered here without problems for many years. Hope this helps.
Good to know that heat will kill thyme - I won't waste my time with it. (ha ha)
I'll check out all of these suggestions. Ice plant sounds nice since it would be so easily propagated. I don't want to go broke since I have quite a bit of space to fill.
asian jasmine is contained in my landscape using metal barriers. In my garden it grows into itself until it has become a very tight groundcover mass. As such, wouldn't recommend it as a "temporary" filler. It grows into itself so tight that I can only imagine how much fun it would be to clear the space for new plantings. But besides that, it doesn't grow up my walls, or beyond the barriers. I also don't provide supplemental water, don't weed, don't trim. It was a chore planting the various seedlings 10 years ago, but since then, I've done little else.
It has worked for me because it is in areas where I don't intend to plant anything else and it grows so tight that weeds do not grow. So for me, and I repeat, for me, it is a low maint. alternative, given my personal gardening requirements.
I hope you find what suits your needs.
You could try Frog Fruit, it is a native groundcover with pretty little white flowers,
here is the link, http://davesgarden.com/pf/go/62730
Josephine.
I planted asian jasmine along the front porch. Was told nothing will last there. Too much afternoon sun and runoff from the roof. Ha! The last laugh is mine. I edge it quickly with a sharp straight edge shovel and trim the new growth once or twice a year. It looks nice and green year around. I can live with the maintenance.
How about Mazus Reptans ?
It looks a bit like Thyme and takes full sun.
Freezes down in winter here ( 40 miles north of Houston) but returns in spring and it's easy care..
I had never heard of mazus reptans or frog fruit. How cool. Any idea of where to find frog fruit? I didn't see an online vendor for that one.
I might try the asian jasmine for trailing down a stone retaining wall. It seems like it would look nice for that.
Check the plantfiles before using frog fruit. It's classified as a noxious weed and invasive. I don't know if it's evergreen or not. I'm sure someone on here can tell you though.
Noel -- I live in north Austin and we have been slowly replacing our extensive lawns with more waterwise and lower maintenance groundcovers. The most reliable one we've found so far is Veronica 'Blue Reflection'. It's 3" tall, evergreen, and spreads at a quite controllable rate. It seems happiest in very light shade or when it gets at least a couple hours in shade sometime during the day. For smaller areas of coverage in full sun we've had success with Verbena peruviana (Red Devil Verbena - 4"H, semi-evergreen, blooms March - hard freeze) and Verbena tenera 'Sissinghurst' (evergreen, 5-6"H, blooms 12 months).
We have many types of bulbs that come up through these groundcovers -- daffodils, Freesia, Oxblood Lilies, Lycoris radiata, Gravetye Giant Snowflakes... The groundcover really shows them off nicely.
jessileigh
Would it be crazy to try one of the mint varieties if it was contained with edging? I'm not sure if mint would even do well in Texas heat. It might need too much water too.
jessileigh - that's great info. I love verbena, and since 'Sissinghurst' is evergreen that might be near perfect. Thanks!
Ever thought of creeping phlox or what we call Louisiana phlox? It does bloom in the spring but most of the time its evergreen. Very tough too, used to be in an area the kids walked over all the time. I think its native too, at least through parts of the south, not sure about Texas. Everything down here is in clay soil so it can certainly take that.
http://davesgarden.com/pf/go/973/index.html
Frog fruit is also a good native groundcover, as Josephine stated.
Debbie
I have a huge mint patch. I don't think bed edging will keep it in check. I knew how invasive it was so put it in a small bed area at the base of a fountain that is surrounded by concrete pool decking. There is one "joint" in the concrete and the mint has invaded that small joint of soil and has moved about 4 to 5 feet across it in one year. If I didn't periodically poke a sharp knife and pull up what I can from that spot, I think it would be into the othe flower beds. It looks and smells really good just outside the den windows and door in spring, but by this time of year the heat is making it kind of scraggly. I'll use the weedeater on it and cut it back and it'll resprout and look a bit better, but by end of August, it'll look pretty bad and won't look good again until next spring.
dmj, see in the plant files that it is good to z8b. But I gather you grow it? sure is pretty
What about ajuga? It works well in sun or shade, is low growing and has beautiful blue flowers in the spring and again in the fall sometimes.
Vossner, I'm well north of I10 west of hwy 6 and near 529--we get freezes every winter here on the little house on the Katy Prairie. Yes I grow it, yes it is real pretty for a short time in the spring.
hmmmm. might be too hot for my neck of the woods.
Trunnels, doesn't your ajuga burn to a crisp in full sun, especially this year when you guys have been a full time oven?
I like ajuga, but was afraid it would burn in full sun. Phlox is very nice too, glad to hear it can handle our texas weather.
Believe me, ajuga will not tolerate full sun. I spent a lot of money and did a full summer of hand watering finding that out. I gave the dying plants to a friend who put them in semi-shade and shade, and they now look glorious.
I too am looking for a ground cover other than asian jasmine that will take blistering full sun until the last rays of the sun go down.
I even tried vinca major a month or 6 weeks ago. It is supposed to be indestructible. It is shrivelling up- burning up. I nearly broke my back putting in large transplants with lots of soil on the roots, and I was very attentive to its water needs.
Any suggestions? I doubt I'd ever find frog fruit for sale in Temple/Waco. I'd probably get plenty of odd looks asking for it, though.
Slaroussels, in case you are interested, here is the list of Texas invasive plants.
Frog fruit is not one of them. I just wanted to clear that up.
http://www.texasinvasives.org/Invasives_Database/Results/Inv_Results.asp
Josephine.
This message was edited Jul 27, 2006 3:00 PM
Jamesstorrs, if you would like to purchase Frog fruit, the Veterans park wildscape is having a plant sale here in Arlington Saturday, October 7th, they have lots of it at $4.00 per quart pot, it works great in tough situations like you describe.
I work as a volunteer at the wildscape and can assure you, it works.
Josephine.
Josephine, can you give some info on the times of that sale? Since I will be up there the next day--maybe I'll just hit it one day early. =)
I don't know the time yet, but i will surely let you know.
Nery, I have ajuga all through the beds in front of the house. One area of them gets full sun from sun up til 2 in the afternoon, and the other area doesn't get the sun until around 3 in the afternoon and has it until sun goes down at 9. They are handling the heat as well as anything right now.
trunnels- what direction does the front of your house face?
Hey Noel,
I believe I have seen frog fruit at the Natural Gardener
http://www.naturalgardeneraustin.com/
Another consideration is silver pony foot. It spreads and roots as it goes. It is very pretty as well. I think it is hardier than is listed on DG, since it is the grow green book.
http://davesgarden.com/pf/go/76508/index.html
http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/growgreen/plantguide/viewdetails.cfm?plant_id=227
You can look for ground cover here as well, just scroll down:
http://www.ci.austin.tx.us/growgreen/plantguide/searchplant.cfm
I just saw that the Dichondra may be deciduous. It may still be worth it.
David
I have lots and lots of frogfruit. It grows wild in our pastures.
Patsy
Hey, thanks for the great links David. From browsing the Austin landscaping site, it looks like oregano might make a nice choice as well.