For people who want to grow more food with less work. 🌱 This is my weekly newsletter loved by 38,000+ subscribers—here's what one of them had to say: "These are not the regular run-of-the-mill garden-based emails. You actually touch on more unusual tidbits that encourage me to keep growing and learning."
my favorite walkable ground covers
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This past week I attempted round #2 of getting miniclover established in my vegetable garden paths. I initially tried this last year, but procrastinated all spring and when I finally got around to sowing my seeds in summer, the weather turned brutally hot and we went out of town for two months (so the miniclover didn't get enough water to germinate). So, here I am with a new bag of seeds and watering the ground twice daily! (The seeds are bright pink, which really help to see where they've been tossed. I mix them with soil to help them stick to the ground better.) I got my miniclover seeds from here, and I also sowed these Johnny jump ups (wild pansies) along the bottom edges of some of my raised beds. The goal is to grow a dense carpet of miniclover in my garden paths (accented with pretty little pansies) to try to outcompete the grass I currently have. One of my friends grew an entire miniclover lawn in her backyard a couple years ago and I loved how it looked. It stayed green all summer, didn't need as much water as a regular lawn, and more importantly, handled heavy foot traffic really well. Miniclover and similar walkable ground covers can carpet a large area like this, but they're also ideal between pavers and around stepping stones—basically any place you might put grass because you don't want to trample your plants. However, walkable ground covers (also known as steppables) are low-growing plants that are meant to be walked on, so you (and your kids and pets) can't hurt them! P.S. Go beyond grass and plant a walkable ground cover in your garden paths. P.P.S. That two-month trip I mentioned above? It was a 7,000-mile work trip to write and photograph my newest project, The Route 66 Cookbook, which is now available for preorder! |
Garden Betty
For people who want to grow more food with less work. 🌱 This is my weekly newsletter loved by 38,000+ subscribers—here's what one of them had to say: "These are not the regular run-of-the-mill garden-based emails. You actually touch on more unusual tidbits that encourage me to keep growing and learning."