Yarrow lawn?

Morning all

I will soon be ready to seed a patch in dry, part shade, as a lawn.

I'm not convinced that grass will do well there, and in any case, I'm a bit bored of grass at the moment.

So I've been thinking of other ground cover plants that are as tough as old DM boots and pleasant to walk on.

I've considered:

Mint kept short - conditions might be too dry for it as it is a raised, free draining patch. Light levels would be ideal for mint so with regular watering it would thrive.

Thyme: Will tolerate the dry conditions, and being low growing it would be ideal, but the spot only gets the evening sun, so maybe not enough.

Yarrow: I know this thrives in dry conditions, forms a lush green soft mat, is as tough as old boots, smells pleasant when crushed. But would it do ok in part shade (ie, gets direct sun from about 3PM til nearly 8PM at this time of year?

Chamomile (a mix of Treneague and the normal flowering one): Perfect, except for the lack of direct sunlight hours.

Oregano/Marjoram: Wouldn't that be lovely, would be happy in the dry conditions I think, but probably not sunny enough.

Pebbles: Pebbles will thrive in just about any conditions except consistently wet, where they have a tendency to sink. They are also vulnerable to browsing by 2 year olds.


So yarrow seems like its slightly in the lead. What do we think?

 

Have you done this yet?

Yarrow would be an interesting choice as it's usually being taken out of lawns! That said a large patch would be a focal point and as long as you prevented it spreading would do exactly what you're looking for. It should establish well and be fairly easy to maintain as it'll take over the area and act as it's own weed police, preventing a lot of weeds germinating and growing.

Chamomile makes fantastic lawns but is notoriously difficult to maintain as there's no real treatment to use to rid the lawn of weeds. It's literally hand weeding all the way to maintain.

Let us know how you get/got on.

 

Cheers Axl, no I haven't done it yet. Still struggling to decide.

A few years ago I read a great article that in some parts of the med region, they hold an entirely different view of yarrow to how we see it, often choosing it for low maintenance lawns in areas that are too dry for grass to thrive, but more recently I couldn't find any article casting a positive light on it.

For the time being, while I ponder it, it is now covered in a layer of bark chippings, which personally I don't like, but the missus thinks its ok, and it will do until I finally decide its longer term fate.

 

Ooo, missed this one Dave,

Thrift with shingle infill & a bucket of rabbits to keep everything else down

 

What's that then Zig?