Looking for suggestions on what to plant in this area. It was originally St Augustine grass. Multiple floods from hurricanes and high traffic (dogs playing) have stripped the area. I’ve got a banana stand to the right and nothing to the left. Two raised beds are planted with sunflowers, native wildflowers, and native grass.
Key issue: this space floods and remains under water for a good week or so during hurricanes. Also looking to prevent even more erosion in this area.
Our dogs run and play mostly in this space so looking for options that could withstand pups running through once established. I’ll rope off the area for new plants. Hopefully looking for FFL recommendations.
by Electrical-Time4271
4 Comments
There is not real solution here. You’re not going to grow native groundcover in high traffic areas. Sometimes turf is an acceptable solution.
Do a chip drop and mulch the area. That’s what I do for half of my backyard.
Mexican Clover would actually be a great solution I think. The biggest difficulties would be getting it established and finding seed. It may not be native, but it is naturalized. It’s the low growing cover that puts out the little purple flowers heading into late summer/fall. Bees love it.
That stuff is hardy and spreads. Drought tolerant. It requires 6 hours of sunlight to establish though. I used it to take over and stabilize an area in my yard. Lucky for me, I had another area on the same property where it was established and thriving. I let it grow all last summer and go to seed. Then I mowed with a bagger, dried it in the sun with a fan for a week. Then crumpled and spread it over freshly tilled sugar sand.
Again, I don’t know where you can find the seed. And you’d probably have to thin the tree a bit to let light through. You may have to lay some netting or something to protect the soil while it establishes. I used chicken wire, and pulled it up before it became ingrained under the spreading Mexican Clover.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richardia_grandiflora
Might not be the best for this application, but I just did an area that is dry but randomly gets lots of runoff, and is frequently walked on, with turf stone pavers and some plants plugged in the open spots.
https://preview.redd.it/05v1gb4oihdf1.jpeg?width=1151&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=407f50fa33e4f5174e8f124765c255eea985aed6