What About Lawns In Shade?

Why try to grow a lawn where it simply doesn't want to grow?

In shady areas, especially the north side of buildings or under trees, grass often struggles to fill in and look beautiful for you. But the same sites that are bad for your lawn can be excellent for shade loving ground cover or a garden of shrubs, perennials, or wild flowers. These grow very well in shade. Try planting these plants:


Dwarf rhododendrons
Ferns
Hostas
Creeping flox
Dwarf Chinese astilbes

These recommendations grow all year long, look pretty and require very little care. Good choices, indeed, for any Weekend Gardener.

If you want the open feeling of the lawn replace parts of it with groundcover that grows no more than about 6-8 inches tall. Or get creative and replace areas with more exciting choices like perennial flower border, a shrub bed, a meadow or if you live in a 'sturdy' area try a wildflower garden.

In arid areas stones and pebbles can make an attractive hardscape- or a non plant area. In townhouses, and condominium garden areas can really dominate smaller landscapes very effectively.