I plan to sell my house in 2009. The grass, front
and back, is a bad mix of whatever. Rather than
having it torn up and relaced with rolls of grass,
I'd like to tear it up and replace it with plugs
of groud cover. I am completely ignorant of ground
cover and would appreciate suggestions.

Dick

On Sun, 20 Jul 2008 02:17:32 +0000 (UTC), (Dick
Adams) wrote:

I plan to sell my house in 2009. The grass, front
and back, is a bad mix of whatever. Rather than
having it torn up and relaced with rolls of grass,
I'd like to tear it up and replace it with plugs
of groud cover. I am completely ignorant of ground
cover and would appreciate suggestions.

Dick

I would think that grass would have better sales value that some other
ground cover. Ask some local realtors for their opinion. If I were
buying and saw something other than grass I'd wonder about upkeep or
the cost of removing it and replacing it with something else.

You might try overseeding it with some grass mix selected to do well
in your area, water it well and mow often.

(Dick Adams) wrote in news:g5u77s$9r0$1
@reader1.panix.com:

I plan to sell my house in 2009. The grass, front
and back, is a bad mix of whatever. Rather than
having it torn up and relaced with rolls of grass,
I'd like to tear it up and replace it with plugs
of groud cover. I am completely ignorant of ground
cover and would appreciate suggestions.

how big an area? groundcovers can take awhile to spread.
my preference would be for thyme, or chamomile. my yard has a
lot of wild strawberry, bugle (both green & purple), & um,
plantain. most people think plantain is really ugly, but the
honeybees love it & the chickens can't destroy it (ok, most
people don't have chicken-proof as a groundcover criteria).
have you looked at Steppables.com?
lee
--
Last night while sitting in my chair
I pinged a host that wasn't there
It wasn't there again today
The host resolved to NSA.

Charles wrote in
:

On Sun, 20 Jul 2008 02:17:32 +0000 (UTC),
(Dick Adams) wrote:

I plan to sell my house in 2009. The grass, front
and back, is a bad mix of whatever. Rather than
having it torn up and relaced with rolls of grass,
I'd like to tear it up and replace it with plugs
of groud cover. I am completely ignorant of ground
cover and would appreciate suggestions.

Dick

I would think that grass would have better sales value that
some other ground cover. Ask some local realtors for their
opinion. If I were buying and saw something other than
grass I'd wonder about upkeep or the cost of removing it
and replacing it with something else.

yeah, i don't know what i'll do about my "lawn" if we decided
to sell. we've pretty much allowed native groundcover plants
to take over & there's very little actual grass type plants in
the front anymore. the back has more because, well, it travels
from the pasture & hay seeds get dropped, seeds in manure
sprout, etc. so there's grass, but it's not pretty.
the front is mostly wild strawberry, which is a very low
growing plant that stays green in hot dry summer & has pretty
red leaves in the fall. and spreads like crazy... we even
sometimes get strawberries if we can find them before the wild
birds & chickens.

You might try overseeding it with some grass mix selected
to do well in your area, water it well and mow often.

if the house is even remotely suburban, that's probably the
best course, because it takes a few years to establish any
alternative groundcover to the point it looks decent & can
keep weeds down on it's own. selling a house where the newly
groundcovered yard needs constant hand weeding isn't going to
be easy, not that selling *any* house is very easy right now.
lee
--
Last night while sitting in my chair
I pinged a host that wasn't there
It wasn't there again today
The host resolved to NSA.

On Sun, 20 Jul 2008 11:56:23 +0000 (UTC), enigma
wrote:

Charles wrote in
:

On Sun, 20 Jul 2008 02:17:32 +0000 (UTC),
(Dick Adams) wrote:

I plan to sell my house in 2009. The grass, front
and back, is a bad mix of whatever. Rather than
having it torn up and relaced with rolls of grass,
I'd like to tear it up and replace it with plugs
of groud cover. I am completely ignorant of ground
cover and would appreciate suggestions.

Dick

I would think that grass would have better sales value that
some other ground cover. Ask some local realtors for their
opinion. If I were buying and saw something other than
grass I'd wonder about upkeep or the cost of removing it
and replacing it with something else.

yeah, i don't know what i'll do about my "lawn" if we decided
to sell. we've pretty much allowed native groundcover plants
to take over & there's very little actual grass type plants in
the front anymore. the back has more because, well, it travels
from the pasture & hay seeds get dropped, seeds in manure
sprout, etc. so there's grass, but it's not pretty.
the front is mostly wild strawberry, which is a very low
growing plant that stays green in hot dry summer & has pretty
red leaves in the fall. and spreads like crazy... we even
sometimes get strawberries if we can find them before the wild
birds & chickens.

You might try overseeding it with some grass mix selected
to do well in your area, water it well and mow often.

if the house is even remotely suburban, that's probably the
best course, because it takes a few years to establish any
alternative groundcover to the point it looks decent & can
keep weeds down on it's own. selling a house where the newly
groundcovered yard needs constant hand weeding isn't going to
be easy, not that selling *any* house is very easy right now.
lee


It takes a long time for most groundcover's to cover an area. Planting
grass would be faster, and probably less expensive. I found that it
takes 3 years to change a poor lawn into a thick green lawn. In any
event, use plants that grow well in your area to speed things up.

On 7/19/2008 7:17 PM, Dick Adams wrote:
I plan to sell my house in 2009. The grass, front
and back, is a bad mix of whatever. Rather than
having it torn up and relaced with rolls of grass,
I'd like to tear it up and replace it with plugs
of groud cover. I am completely ignorant of ground
cover and would appreciate suggestions.

Dick

My front lawn was planted with pink clover (Persicaria capitata, not
really a clover but with clover-like flowers). This was done about 8-9
months ago on 18-inch centers; rooted plants -- not plugs -- were used.
Now, the ground cover is thick enough to crowd out most weeds. It took
a lot of water to reach this state, but I can start to cut back on the
water since the pink clover totally shades the soil.

Note, however, my climate. Pink clover is hardy only to about 15F. As
an evergreen ground cover, it likely will not tolerate a persistent
cover of snow. (Actually, when we get frost, it turns red; it then
reverts to green when the weather warms in the spring.) I suspect that,
if the past winter here had 15F temperatures, my pink clover might not
have spread as quickly as it did. "kzin" is quite correct; you really
need to tell us where you are so that we know what your climate is.

--
David E. Ross
Climate: California Mediterranean
Sunset Zone: 21 -- interior Santa Monica Mountains with some ocean
influence (USDA 10a, very close to Sunset Zone 19)
Gardening pages at http://www.rossde.com/garden/