Planting groundcovers is a great way to reduce the time you spend maintaining your garden. Groundcovers can also add color, texture and variety to your garden. Anywhere mowing is difficult or grass is difficult to grow, such as shady areas beneath large shade trees, may be ideal spots for groundcovers. Difficult spots such as rocky slopes or areas with poor soil can be planted with groundcovers such as thyme (Thymu vulgaris) or sedum (Sedum spurium) as they require little soil and can tolerate poor soils.
Groundcovers require much less maintenance than lawn as the they don’t need to be mowed. Some groundcovers, such as ajuga (Ajuga Reptans), are even tough enough to walk on and can be planted around stepping stone where grass is often trampled. Steep slopes, where rain water can cause erosion, benefit from groundcover plantings as their roots hold the soil in place. Baltic ivy (Hedra helix var. Baltica), vinca (Vinca minor) and pachysandra (Pachysandra terminalis) tolerate shade and can replace a thin lawn beneath trees.
Some groundcovers will flower. For example, vinca and ajuga have purple, white or yellow flowers in the spring. The white flowers of Lily-of-the-valley (Convallaria majalis) are prized for their strong fragrance.
Low growing and creeping shrubs such as cotoneaster (Cotoneaster horizontalis) and euonymus (Euonymus fortunei) are great as groundcovers. Other groundcovers worth trying are sweet woodruff (Galium odoratum) and ginger (Asarum europaeum) both of which do well in deep shade.
Though all plants require at least some maintenance, groundcover are easy to grow and require little care. For groundcovers, maintenance includes pulling weeds and pruning them a few times a season to keep them contained to the areas you want them. If you don’t they’ll spread into lawn or shrub beds. Some varieties, such as English ivy (Hedra helix), if left unchecked, may even begin to grow up the trunks of trees. About once a month check on you groundcovers and cut them back as needed. Some groundcovers, such as sedum, may need to be deadheaded after they flower.
Prepare the soil as you would for any garden before planting your groundcovers. Groundcovers don’t like competition so while your groundcover are establishing themselves be sure to remove any weeds which emerge. Once groundcovers establish themselves they become dense forming a beautiful, low maintenance, carpet-like garden feature.
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