ground cover

[Auricula]

Hi
My long, wide herbaceous border is the bane of my life!!
As it has only experienced 2 frosts in the 3 years it's been planted, the weeds keep growing - especially creeping buttercup, dandelions and nettles.
I need good ground cover, which will let the flowers spread and self seed - hardy geraniums and alchemilla mollis are too tall - I wondered about heucheras, would they be ok and spread?
Any ideas?
Thanks

[andy]

I tend to think that you should allow the perennial weeds to grow next spring and then spray them with a glyphosate based weed killer such as roundup. This will make sure all the roots are dead.

Otherwise, if you plant on top of the weeds, they will just push through and it will be time and money wasted.

With most things in life, you'll only get out of gardening what you put in....eg if you put the work in to rid the border of weeds, you will have very little to do in future and have a very nice looking border.

As for groundcover plants, i'd be looking at hypericum calycinum, vinca major varigata, cerastium, arabis, alyssum saxatile, small dianthus, helianthemum and aubretia. Most will grow a few feet and give a good show. You could also think of some of the smaller herbs. There's some lovely creeping thymes, trailing rosemary and smaller sages. There are also some low growing shrubs such as cotton lavender (santolina) and spirea 'little princess'. Some of the dwarf grasses will be nice too such as festuca glauca.

Hope this helps a bit.....let us know if this isn't the sort of thing you're after and i'm sure we can come up with something else.

[Plocket]

Sounds as though you've got your work cut out Auricula. Once you've had a serious attack on the weeds you could consider putting down a mulch but don't forget that things like bark and gravel can attract cats.

Hucheras are good but you'll have to look out for smaller varieties - some grow bushier than others but at the moment my new Obsidian seems to be quite low growing, and they don't spread much. There's a very small euphorbia which clambers about the place but I can't remember it's name, and also some small sedums which are great through winter. I don't think they'll stop the weeds completely though.

[obelixx]

HI Auricula - I get very heavy frosts and also nettles, buttercups, thistles, couch grass etc. It's a question of soil fertility and space to grow in plus, for me, being surrounded by arable fields and pasture with a constant supply of new weeds trying to invade my garden.

You just have to keep weeding when you see them with a major blitz in spring to allow returning perennials the space to grow and another in the autumn as the weeds are very hardy and will survive th efrosts better than some desirables. Eventually they fill out and the weeds give up - or become more manageable.

I find hardy geraniums, persicaria, pulmonaria and heucheras make good ground cover. Phlomis, lysimachia forms and ornamental grasses and tall and short sedums do well too at growing too densely to leave space for weeds.

[Auricula]

Thanks - I'm off to the nursery tomorrow!!

[Deleted]

I have to agree with Andy, those weeds will our compete anything you try to grow - get rid of them first them plant the groundcover.

[Deleted]

Auricula - how is the bed situated?

In the middle of a lawn? Up against a hedge? Compass points and sunshine please.

Blitz the weeds first.

[Auricula]

The bed is about 6ft deep and 40ft long. It backs on to a stream ( about 2ft below the bed ) and over the other side of the stream is a field bordered by trees. It faces south but is shaded a bit by a hedge opposite. Because we rarely get frost the weeds just grow all the time and seeds get blown across from the fields.
Any suggestions gratefully received