imple Vegetarian | The ultimate ground cover?

One of the maximum popular posts I've ever done in this blog is this vintage one from 2011 close to ground covers. It noted the issue of finding a appropriate floor cowl for our the front outside, which could want to have the subsequent functions:

• Able to grow in our climate (UDSA Zone 7)
• Able to grow in our heavy clay soil
• Tolerant of full afternoon sun, but not requiring full sun all day
• Low-maintenance
• Able to tolerate some light foot traffic
• Low-growing, so we would never have to mow it (this was crucial)
• Non-invasive

As it turned out, there weren't a lot of plants that ticked all those boxes. In fact, I'd been able to find only three: smooth rupturewort (Herniaria glabra), barren strawberry (Waldensteinia fragarioides), and Dutch white clover (Trifolium repens). Weighing the pros and cons of all three of these, I decided the clover was probably the most ecofrugal, and I had a go at planting some in the back yard, but sadly, it didn't thrive as we'd hoped it would. I went on to experiment with other ground covers, such as creeping thyme, but none of them really turned into the easy-care green carpet that I'd hoped for.

But now, eight years later, it looks as if we may additionally in truth have located the suitable floor cover completely with the resource of accident. Or to be greater correct, it determined us.

You see, we simply occurred to have a hint little bit of barren strawberry developing in our again outside while we offered the region. And because it became first-rate and inexperienced and grew well with out a attempt on our detail, we have been happy to permit it grow anywhere it preferred. In truth, over the years, we've got helped it alongside with the aid of pulling out the weeds (in particular mugwort) that came about to be its number one competition. And via this spring, I located that the barren strawberry vegetation had extra or tons less truly colonized one complete corner of our once more outdoor.

Just test that lush blanket of inexperienced, developing thickly and calmly throughout the complete spread from the patio to the border of the honeyberry mattress (and even mountaineering barely up the wall). Left to its personal devices, the barren strawberry did all this with none planting, feeding, or maybe watering on our issue. It does not need mowing, however could no longer item to having the mower pushed over it inside the components of the backyard that still have grass. It might now not thoughts being walked throughout on a ordinary basis as we visit and from the clothesline. It has even managed to choke out most of the mugwort in that part of the backyard, a few issue I wasn't positive modified into viable.

Now, I understand a few oldsters don't forget this plant a weed. Even my gardening books describe it as aggressive (despite the fact that given that it is a neighborhood plant, it can not technically be considered invasive). But frankly, I suppose that aggressiveness (or we could name it

One comment at Dave's Garden says it's "easily propagated by soft tip cuttings in water," so maybe I'll try clipping a piece or two and seeing if I can sprout some of these to spread to the front yard. If I can get it to spread there as exuberantly as it did in the back, in another nine years we might finally have the mower-free landscape we've always wanted out there.