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Susbtitute grass

looksee · 2021-03-07 09:43:41

I have an area in my garden where an above-ground swimming pool was taken out. The sloping ground was in fact dug out on three sides to accommodate the pool and the sides, varying between 4ft and none, are stable, I may put in some small gabions in places but I am mostly going to grow plants against them. The ground is…

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07-03-2021 10:43am

#1

looksee

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I have an area in my garden where an above-ground swimming pool was taken out. The sloping ground was in fact dug out on three sides to accommodate the pool and the sides, varying between 4ft and none, are stable, I may put in some small gabions in places but I am mostly going to grow plants against them.

The ground is sandy shale so is very free draining, there are no waterlogging issues.

I would like to turn it into a kind of sunken garden, its a bit of a sun trap and would make a nice sheltered area to sit. The base is very solid and flat (slight, even gradient but flat, I have not disturbed it. It appears to be a reasonable depth of something like 804 and gravel with sand on top. There were plastic liners between the subsurface and the sand and these have been removed, the sand can be relevelled easily.

I was going to pave it, but am coming round to the idea of just having a few paving slabs in one area, mixing some soil through the sand and planting something to make an interesting ground cover that can be walked on. Like clover or chamomile, for example. I know thyme is used but it would be expensive and slow.

Does anyone have any experience of any of these kind of lawns? It would only have light, occasional foot traffic and I could put a path in the most used area.

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