The ground cover at the front of our house is a mess. That is because I have been attacking it at the suggestion of my husband. You see, part of the ground cover is a lush covering of pacasandra. This pachysandra is in areas around our yard. To the right of the house as you are looking at it, the pachysandra is well established and looks great. To the far left of the house, the pacasandra also looks well. But in between, we have a problem. Vinca, another nice ground cover has started to take over, choking out the pachysandra and causing all sorts of problems.
We decided to get rid of the vinca for two reasons. The first is, as mentioned, the rest of the yard has lush pachysandra, so keeping it in the front makes sense for continuity. And two is that this type of pacasandra seems to be behaving well, never going outside of the lines, so to speak. In contrast, the vinca is crawling across our walk and up the side of the house. it also has never flowered.
So, every morning and afternoon while I wait for the school bus or while the kids play outside, I have been pulling up the long vinery strands of vinca. It is like having some living organic puzzle, since the vines twist around the pachysandra and around each other. Sometimes I have to unravel the stands before I pull them up. Once in a while, a pachysandra plant becomes a casualty, although fortunately this isn’t too often.
Unfortunately, without the cover of green that the vinca provides, the front of the house on that middle-left side looks pretty much the worse for wear. Our consolation is that next year, and the year after, the pachysandra should fill in nicely. Worse comes to worse, we can fill it in ourselves with new plants, provided that the threat of the vinca is gone.
Mary Ann Romans writes about everything related to saving money in the Frugal Blog, technology in the Computing Blog, and creating a home in the Home Blog. You can read more of her articles by clicking here.
Related Articles:
Five Clever Landscape and Gardening Tips