legume/clover for short, low maintenance yard?
Most people don't want clover in their lawns because of appearance.
Evidently that is the case - I got a laugh when I went to the Scott's
website and saw a picture of Dutch White Clover, and a description of it
as an annoying weed, and that you should fertilizer your yard more
(probably with Scott's fertilizer, right? :-) and it will eventually go
away.
I actually planted my last lawn about 50% to dutch white clover,
because I like the stuff, it doesn't seem to grow as fast, and it never
needed fertilized or watered. I like the flowers from dandelions as
well, but I'll admit that they can take over.
I grew up on a farm where the yard was always about 50% native
plants, including various wildflowers left over from when it was more
wooded. There was no way I was going to put down herbicides and kill
off all of those violets, spring beauties, or deertongue (glacier
lilies), for example.
While the lawn may not look like a golf course, I think the diversity
of plants makes it more resistant to various problems.
If the lawn has sufficient nitrogen it will get thick enough
to crowd out the clover.
I would prefer for the clover to fix the nitrogen naturally, and then
provide a little extra to the grasses. I'm going for low maintenance,
low cost, and low environmental impact. If I could eat grass, I could
justify spending more time and money on the lawn. However, I would much
rather spend the time and money on my fruit trees and other things that
I can eat. That is probably my farm background talking, because I'd
also rather let a couple of sheep loose in the yard, rather than mowing.
(which would also give us free fertilizer at the same time) Can't get
away with that around here, though.
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