Hi everyone,
I just joined the forum and hope that I can get some suggestions for a landscaping question.
I'm looking for a very short (2"-4"), drought tolerant ground cover in a dry shade area for my zone (7, I think). I prefer something native, and definitely want to avoid anything invasive (including Virginia Creeper). Does anyone have any suggestions?
Thanks in advance!
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rainbowgardener
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 25279
- Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
- Location: TN/GA 7b
Dry shade is a tough environment, but here's a few suggestions:
Partridge berry (aka twinberry, running box, Mitchella repens) is a creeping ground cover just a couple inches high. It is evergreen, has little white flowers, then red berries that birds (including partridges, hence the name) like. Very nice, but your soil needs to be acidic as it does for pretty much all of these.
Wild ginger. There are several varieties of this including an evergreen one, Hexastylis arifolia. They have very inconspicuous little reddish-brown flowers under the leaves where they are not visible. It is not related to culinary ginger, but it does form a very nice looking green carpet of heart shaped leaves.
hepatica. Forms spreading colonies of very attractive variegated lobed leaves which last through the winter, and then has lavender-pink flowers in the spring.
Bunchberry. This is a creeping prostrate dogwood and has the same beautiful flowers a dogwood tree does, followed by red berries that birds like. It is not so drought tolerant as the others, you would have to add water, and it definitely requires acidic soil, but it is so beautiful, it might be worth a little extra work.
Wintergreen. Evergreen low woody ground cover, with beautiful dark green leaves from which wintergreen tea and flavorings are made. It has little white flowers and then showy red berries that last all winter. I want some of this so badly, but I just can't make my alkaline soil suitable for it and keep killing it. But if you have acidic soil, this would be wonderful.
Sweet woodruff. It is a lovely quick growing ground cover with attractive whorls of leaves and little white flowers. The leaves interestingly have no scent when living on the plant, but once dried have a very pleasant vanilla-ish scent which is used to flavor wine. In the right conditions it can be an aggressive spreader, but dry shade is not the right conditions. It will grow there, but won't be aggressive.
All of these except the sweet woodruff are native plants and so are hardy and adaptable once established. They would probably be difficult to find locally unless you have a very good native plant nursery, but all would be available on-line.
Enjoy!
Partridge berry (aka twinberry, running box, Mitchella repens) is a creeping ground cover just a couple inches high. It is evergreen, has little white flowers, then red berries that birds (including partridges, hence the name) like. Very nice, but your soil needs to be acidic as it does for pretty much all of these.
Wild ginger. There are several varieties of this including an evergreen one, Hexastylis arifolia. They have very inconspicuous little reddish-brown flowers under the leaves where they are not visible. It is not related to culinary ginger, but it does form a very nice looking green carpet of heart shaped leaves.
hepatica. Forms spreading colonies of very attractive variegated lobed leaves which last through the winter, and then has lavender-pink flowers in the spring.
Bunchberry. This is a creeping prostrate dogwood and has the same beautiful flowers a dogwood tree does, followed by red berries that birds like. It is not so drought tolerant as the others, you would have to add water, and it definitely requires acidic soil, but it is so beautiful, it might be worth a little extra work.
Wintergreen. Evergreen low woody ground cover, with beautiful dark green leaves from which wintergreen tea and flavorings are made. It has little white flowers and then showy red berries that last all winter. I want some of this so badly, but I just can't make my alkaline soil suitable for it and keep killing it. But if you have acidic soil, this would be wonderful.
Sweet woodruff. It is a lovely quick growing ground cover with attractive whorls of leaves and little white flowers. The leaves interestingly have no scent when living on the plant, but once dried have a very pleasant vanilla-ish scent which is used to flavor wine. In the right conditions it can be an aggressive spreader, but dry shade is not the right conditions. It will grow there, but won't be aggressive.
All of these except the sweet woodruff are native plants and so are hardy and adaptable once established. They would probably be difficult to find locally unless you have a very good native plant nursery, but all would be available on-line.
Enjoy!
-
rainbowgardener
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 25279
- Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
- Location: TN/GA 7b
Do check your soil pH. The wild ginger handles my alkaline soil just fine, though it may not be ideal and the sweet woodruff is pretty tolerant of any kind of soil. The hepatica survives my soil but doesn't grow very fast. All the rest of it will just die if the soil isn't at least a little bit acidic.
