Meaning of "ground cover" in Japanese garden is different from western gardens.
In Japanese garden term of "shitakusa" is translated as ground cover in English. But meaning of Shitakusa is "shita" under or bellow,kusa means grass in Japanese and not same meaning as ground cover in western garden term.
Most of you may think that ground cover means mass of plants to cover ground.
shitakusa is not mean to be cover every squre inch of ground in Japanese garden. Small shurb such as azerlea, enkiianthus,hydreangie , daphne etc. perennial, such as grass,fern, drawf bamoos and don't need to be mass of same plants.
Mike Yamakami