Let's Line Up Our Lawn

Let's mark the contours of our lawn to clearly move toward a reduced lawn shape. Use a clothesline, string or a garden hose to outline it and study the size and shape to see how it balances with the rest of the garden area before you make any final decisions.

The usual choice is to bring in the edges of the lawn, planting the perimeter, but this may create a more closed in feeling, especially with shrubs planted around the edges. An alternative is to create islands within the lawn and plant those with whatever you wish. If there are trees there already, it makes sense to arrange the island around them.

For an open feeling, plant the bed with low flowers and/or evergreen groundcovers. A more wooded look would include flowering shrubs within the island and blanket the ground with mulch or ground covers.

By creating several of these island beds, the remaining grass acts as an alluring path or corridor meandering through the beds. With wide paths and an open planting, the feeling will be "open", spacious and more formal; with narrower paths and taller plantings, te feeling will be that of a woodland.

Another alternative is to turn part of the lawn into a field of colorful flowers. A meadow garden of this type is less work than a lawn, but it isn't as easy and carefree as is often thought, or written about in those magazine articles. The meadow can't be started by simply scattering wild-flower seeds on the lawn. Like any garden it takes some tending.

Remember, as Weekend Gardeners we are attempting to cut down on the lawn expanse to say time and effort!

Next: Mass Planting Ground Covers