Ground Covers South Florida Style v.5

Hi Ya'll, how are you doing?  Hopefully everyone is doing good, staying healthy and keeping hydrated in this hotter than hades  Autumn heat.  If life isn't going great for you, please know I care and am sympathetic to your strife...I've had some seriously hard life moments to navigate through these past few years & before this another set of challenges.  Life is full of challenges, but I found what helped me along the way is two things: learning how to let go & asking for help...so I'm here for ya & thinking good thoughts for you!  With you in mind let's do something fun like talk about nature while getting our minds of the daily grind of life...let's talk ground covers and forget about your worries. Yeah!

Picking up where we left off, yes I know a loooong time ago, lol, let's get right to it shall we cause it's a great day to be hanging out together.

Liriope (liriope muscari) is a beautiful "grass" species that has been used in the landscape industry for eons.  Its dark green strapping leaves shine in the sunlight.  It has a purple hyacinth looking flower stalk that blooms in spring & summer.  Liriope can be used as a border, a mass planting or just a stand alone.  It's a great plant to use as a border to keep soil & mulch from washing out of your plant bed.  Grows in full sun to part shade & not picky about soil conditions, it's pretty hardy & long living; super low maintenance.  Insider tip: make sure you plant them with plenty of space to grow, abt. 24 inches between the plant & either a wall, walkway and/or driveway.  I've seen many people plant them too close to a pathway then have to cut the liriope back...believe it's not a good look for them😂 Their natural shape is the best shape.  We've had liriope growing for up to 30 years on some properties.  Gets to be about 24+ inches wide by high. There is also a variegated hybrid of liriope but word to the wise it's not a big fan of our weather & heat, like northerners in summer lol.   Insider tip: most variegated forms of a plant usually do not have great growing power and are usually sub-par to the original green versions of themselves.

Here I used liriope as a border to soften the extremely large amount of rock 
that was used on this property (we didn't do it lol) & you can see the baby sunrose in the
foreground, it'll all fill out nicely!

This client was super into the tropical vibe, so I used
it here as a border plant with lots of lovely verdant layers.

MY OH MY, mondo grass, how I love you in a landscape.  Mondo grass (ophiopogon japonicus) or 'lily turf' is such a versatile plant to use in every landscape.  It's similar to liriope but very slender strapping leaves and much smaller size.  There are three variations of mondo: standard mondo grass grows to be between 8-15 inches high, dwarf mondo grass grows between 6-8 inches high and the nana mondo grass which gets to be only 3-4 inches high like carpet.  There is also a black mondo grass that looks amazing with chartreuse, mangentas, yellows and kelly greens.  Mondo is great as borders or in mass plantings since it grows in a clumping way.  I use the smaller varieties in mass plantings to fill in space between taller plants.  There is a variegated variety called 'aritaki' but it's not common to find.

At this client's house is the regular mondo grass
around clusters of philodendron 'burle marx'.

This clustering purple/green plant has been in South Florida for a long time, I'm sure you've seen it, it's the oyster plant (rhoeo spathacea).  Its large version has been removed from growing in the nurseries due to its invasive status.  The smaller dwarf variety and a variegated (tri-color) variety don't seem to pose as much threat as the prior and are widely available.  The tri-color oyster is a surprisingly great grower and loves full sun though just so you know the original versions of this plant are super hardy hence the invasiveness factor.  They also have sap that can irritate the skin especially those who have sensitive skin.  Grows about 10-14 inches high.

I redesigned this entry way with the dwarf oyster in the front, Vietnamese
gardenia in the center with the taller alocasia 'California' and cordyline 'florica'
in the back.

What a beauty! Such a jewel to have in the landscape, tri-color (variegated) oyster plant.

Some additional ground covers are:

perennial peanut (Full sun Florida Friendly landscape plant)

peperomia (shady understory plant)

portulaca/purslane (full sun flowering creeper)

sedum (full sun succulent, various varieties)

society garlic (pretty green upright cluster with violet flowers, under rated)

sunshine mimosa (full sun Florida Friendly landscape plant)

trailing chenille (trailing/creeping part sun/part shape w/fluffy red cat tails)

So now you know a few more plants that you can utilized in different areas of your garden.

I'll keep adding to the list so keep checking back in or sign up for notifications so you don't miss out on the latest post.  There's always something new happening around here!

Thank you for spending some of your precious time with me & Happy Gardening Y'all!

Best wishes,

Sheri

xoxo