Use Flowers To Turn A Bad Lawn Into A Native Garden

Are you struggling to get a decent lawn established? There are times when, no matter what you do, having a well established lawn seems to be impossible. There are many reasons for this and it’s not unusual. Often, it’s not the complete lawn, just a section of it. It could be lack of water (or too much), lack of sunshine, or that the soil is just too poor to enable a good lawn to take hold.

If this is happening to you then the time may be right to think laterally. Instead of trying to force a lawn to grow, turn the area into a native garden. This is easier than most people imagine. The emphasis here is on a native garden and what you should be looking at are the grasses and self seeding annuals that are native to your region. Self seeding flowers speak for themselves; at the end of the growing season they drop their seeds before dying back. Native plants will often grow in areas where imported plants won’t.

How do you establish this native garden? You could get a rotary hoe in to dig the area over, but that’s too much work. Since this will be a native grass garden, leave the old grass in place. Cut it as short as possible then use a tool such as the Grass Stitcher to break up the surface a little. This provides a perfect surface to spread a mix of native grasses and flowers. Water well to begin with then keep moist.

From that point on, apart from an occasional watering, leave it to look after itself. The only problem with a free growing native grass and flower garden is that seeds from these plants may find their way into your general garden beds. Catch them early and treat them like any other weed. Don’t stress over a lawn that won’t establish – turn it into a native garden bed with local flowers and grasses.