Do your limbs ache and your lungs labour overtime at the mere thought of pushing that lawn mower all over your yard? Forget torture by having toothpicks plunged under your finger nails. Every summer we volunteer to wear ourselves out, gulping large doses of lung damaging carbon monoxide as we use up another tank of petrol; all to keep our tyrannical lawns tidy.
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The shocking truth is we don’t need to do it: not if we plant a ground cover and keep it healthy. Picture yourself lounging on a banana chair, holding a water hose in one hand as you sip a cool drink from the other. Suddenly the missus calls out, “What are you doing dear?”
Your confident, shaken, not stirred response is, “I’m working hard keeping the yard looking healthy, dearest.”
And that is it. The fact is that a ground cover will look healthy and green without so much as a snip from your shears on top. Maybe a trim around the edges now and then. A drink as required on a free-draining site and Bob’s your uncle (mine was Jack, but that’s all right).
Local native ground cover plant Myoporum parvifolium will give you white or pink flowers in spring. Or maybe you just want a green look all year? No problems! At Elizabeth Park, Dubbo Regional Botanic Garden, we have ground-hugging Juniperus to do the job; growing only 20 to 50 cm tall depending on variety.
This year two difficult areas near the Japanese pond were elected to be planted with Juniper horizontalis varieties. Our prime-mover Japanese garden advisor was in agreement. One position had too much tree competition for root development and the other had Mondo grass which burned off in a full-sun aspect. Solution: plant a Juniper!
The species named has cultivars L.h. ‘Procumbens’, and J.h. ‘Wiltonii’ (also called ‘Blue Rug’ or ‘Wilton Carpet’). This last is perhaps the most attractive with bright-blue, mostly juvenile foliage which changes to purplish-grey in winter.
These Junipers can be slow-growing at first but eventually grow 2 to 3 metres across for each plant.
Another species is Juniper conferta or Japanese Shore Juniper which is a real tough plant. Growing one metre across it covers soil quickly and will spill over walls or embankments. Our one-time builder of the Japanese Garden, Shoyoen, in Dubbo, the late Mr. Peter Morrison (who had an eye for form), suggested we plant J.’Blue Rug’ to soften the rock edge to the pond. Fifteen years later and the juniper is still going strong.
