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Re: Olivier's Lawn-substitutes

 I'm surprised not to hear more about ground-covers on
medit-plants. Are you still fighting with your lawns in the U.S and in
Australia ? Are you allowed to water lawns during the summer, or do you
have water restrictions ? Water restriction is the best ally to
mediterranean botanical research. Here to replace lawns we use plants such
as  Frankenia laevis, Matricaria tchihatchewii, Lippia nodiflora (Phyla
canescens), Zoysia tenuifolia, Dichondra repens (needs some water though),
Stenotaphrum secundatum (in protected areas where frost isn't to bad),
Cynodon... Does any-one have suggestions on other interesting low
maintenance ground-covers to replace lawns ?
Olivier

A not-so-brief history of ground covers/lawn substitutes in California
circa 1945-present:

{Warning: the following contains polemical as well as horticultural
information.}

California was, of course, settled primarily by immigrants from the East.
These settlers brought with them ingrained ideas about what a landscape
should look like;  they also brought the seeds needed to replicate the
plant material that reminded them of the places they grew up.  They prized
trees that changed color in the fall,  dense woodlots and, of course,
lawns.  After World War II with the advent of cheap plastics and, thus,
inexpensive home irrigation systems Californians soon learned that they
could outdo their Eastern forebears in the lawn-making department.

The California climate had the added wrinkle that one could grow *either*
warm season grasses(whose origins were primarily in the tropics and were
thus intolerant of frost) or cool season grasses(origins to the north, the
cool mediterranean nights made them well-suited also).  Throughout the
1950's and 60's the two kinds of grasses existed side-by-side.  In Southern
California the early tract houses often featured *Cynodon dactylon*
(bermuda grass) as developers found this easier and cheaper to install than
the cool season grasses.  However, bermuda often would go dormant and brown
up in December and January.  As Southern California grew and became more
prosperous homeowners often improved their properties by ripping out the
bermuda and replacing it with a sprinkler system(the bermuda needed no
summer irrigation to survive) and a cool season grass(usually either
*Lolium perenne*, perennial ryegrass or *Poa pratensis*, 'Kentucky'
bluegrass).  In Northern California, in the 50' & 60's around the San
Francisco Bay, the warm season grass of choice was, briefly, *Stenotaphrum
secundatum*, St. Augustinegrass.  Developers could install this turf from
plugs, a cheaper alternative to the sod or seed needed for blue's and
rye's.  By chance the St. Augustine neighborhoods mostly came to be the
African-American areas and so you can still find large areas of
*Stenotaphrum* today since those didn't get 'improved' into cool season
turf.

Even in the post-war period there were homeowners who didn't want to push a
lawnmower around every weekend(and I do mean push since gas mowers were
rare).  A few grass alternatives were available, notably *Phylla
nodiflora*, Lippia(see above) and *Dichondra micrantha*.

As California grew more prosperous in the 60's and 70's the trend toward
cool season turf intensified.  By the mid 70's nearly 90% of the turf sold
in California was blue or rye or a blend of the two.  Then came two dry
periods, one in the late 70's the other in the mid-to-late 80's.  Combined
with a rapidly growing California population the dry winters drained the
reservoirs and put the water districts under extreme pressure.  Since most
water boards were elective offices the alternative of raising water prices
to ration the available supply was a distasteful option.  The districts
opted, instead, for a mixture of persuasion, inducement and coercion to
bring down water use levels.  Landscaping was seen as a logical target of
opportunity since it was seen as less necessary than water for drinking or
cleaning.  Homeowners(and developers) were urged to plant 'drought
tolerant' landscapes, native  plants(which were assumed to be drought
tolerant) or go all the way to hardscapes(i.e. rocks and concrete).  When
things got really bad laws were passed limiting the days that homeowners
could water their landscapes;  car washing was severely limited.  One
district in Northern California tried to deny water hook-ups to developers
who failed to meet drouth landscape guidelines(a court threw out the
restrictions).

In the midst of this struggle the water districts lobbied the sod growers
to offer residents a drouthy grass that would not go dormant in winter.
The chosen alternative was a weed grass, *Festuca arundinacea*, Tall
fescue, a cool season grass with a deep root system that could withstand
prolonged drought.  Tall fescue's liability was it coarse texture, a wide
blade that most people found unacceptable compared with the fine textured
blue's and rye's.  University of California researchers had been working on
hybridizing TF to make it more visually acceptable.  By the late 80's the
new TF's were ready, just at a time when the state's reservoirs were at
all-time low levels.  Within about an 18 month period there was an almost
complete turnover in the sod industry.  One year the growers were selling
80% blue/rye, the next year it was 80% tall fescue.

{The almost inevitable irony of the tall fescue movement was that TF,
though it had great resistance to dry periods, required about the same
amount of water(and fertilizer) as bluegrass to keep it looking
first-rate.}

At the same time that turf was changing there were changes in public
attitudes towards non-turf landscapes.  The native plant societies that had
labored in the vineyard for decades suddenly found themselves fashionable.
Though natives are still a tiny portion of the state they have contributed
to a general public awareness of plants that formerly were considered too
ugly to contemplate.  Nurseries now place much more emphasis on the water
needs of species they sell, though, inevitably the science of their claims
is often dubious.  The Sunset Publishing people in Menlo Park, the most
influential garden writers in California, have done a great job of
publicizing University of California research.

The most influential group when it comes to turf alternatives in California
is the state highway department.  Faced with the task and building and
maintaining the world's most extensive system of roads the dept. quickly
learned that they couldn't plant *and* water all their roadsides.
Gradually they abandoned a system of galvanized pipes that attempted to
water what they'd put in the ground;  instead the highway engineers turned
to ground covers and shrubs that they could stick in the ground in the fall
and abandon once the winter rains got them going.  Drivers saw *Gazania
ringens* 'leucolaena', *Baccharis pilularis*(a native!), *Osteospermum
fruticosum*, *Carpobrotus edulis* and a host of other plants and began
asking for them in nurseries.  Even when some of these turned out to be
disappointments in the home landscape(*Osteospermum*, for instance,
couldn't handle the low oxygen levels of clay soil) consumers at least
learned that they could find drouthy species that met their esthetic
criteria.  That, more than anything encouraged homeowners to try something
other than grass.

My own experience tells me that landscape water use in 1997 is not markedly
different than it was per capita in 1970(while total population has doubled
in the same period).  Sprinklers run Monday-Wednesday-Friday whether the
garden contains *Fremontadendron californica* or azaleas.  Sales of
camellias dwarf those of all native species combined.  Outside of pockets
of adventureism like Berkeley or Santa Monica you will find 90% of homes
feature front and backyards that were once lawns and are now mixtures of
*Poa annua*, annual bluegrass;  *Trifolium spp.*, clover;  *Cynodon
dactylon*(reasserting itself into the intended bluegrass);  *Taraxacum
officinale*, dandelions;  *Oxalis pes-caprae*, wood sorrel;  and various
plantains, knotweeds and *Digitaria* crabgrass.  The dominant family of
California horticulture is not Asteraceae its Ericaceae.

The rains resumed in the early 90's and the pressure to replace grass
ebbed.  The new savior is a native US prairie grass called
Buffalograss(*Buchloe dactyloides*).  It's a reasonably attractive turf(I
saw a plot of it at the University of Nebraska a couple years ago) that
requires little summer irrigation.  UC scientists are avidly beating the
drums in praise of it.  I wouldn't bet on any grand conversion unless a)we
have another drought, b)water prices are kept low and c)the commercial
fishing industry(which is the principle group fighting against new dams on
California's rivers) becomes a powerful lobbying organization.  More likely
any new dry periods would be met by draining more rivers.

Jerry Heverly, Oakland, CA

P.S.  Re other species mentioned in your original post:
The only *Matricaria* we have in California is *Matricaria matricarioides*,
Pineapple weed.  (A *nice* weed to me, but still a weed).
Zoysia is something of a horticltural joke in the US.  Plugs for this warm
season grass are frequently advertised on the back pages of Sunday
magazines(the ones that are included with the Sunday newspaper).  It is
always advertised as the 'Wonder grass' or 'Miracle grass', capable of
growing faster than Jack's beanstalk, greener than an Irish meadow, easier
to take care of than fake grass.  It generally ends up as just another weed
in somebody's failed front lawn.  I did see a beautiful test plot at UC
Riverside that combined Zoysia with Tall Fescue.  Now *that* would make a
great lawn.
JH
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