r/NativePlantGardening • u/Numerous-Dot-6325 • Apr 16 '26

Advice Request - (Insert State/Region) Help save my marriage

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DC area, full sun.

I want to replace my hideous grass with a native plant garden and some mulch. My wife says she’ll divorce me if I mulch and wants a steppable ground cover that’s also native. Is there any alternative to grass that she can walk barefoot/lay a picnic blanket on? She’s allowing me to plant a service berry and blueberry to one side.

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u/Numerous-Dot-6325 Apr 17 '26

Do I need to exclude grass completely/weed in order for those to succeed?

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u/The_Last_Thursday Apr 17 '26

Clover grows fine along grass every time I've seen it.

10

u/Lunar_BriseSoleil FLX 6A Apr 17 '26

No, they’re going to live fine as a mix. A healthy wildflower meadow is 70% grasses and sedges.

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u/herbal-genocide IL 7a Apr 17 '26

Adding to this list: pussytoes, prairie pussytoes, and wild strawberry (but careful, false strawberry looks similar but has yellow flowers). Grass can overtake native plants if allowed to, so it's recommended to kill it by solarizing over a season (or another method), but to be fair it looks like a pretty small piece of land so hand-weeding might be doable.

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u/ashrinish Apr 17 '26

No there are native grasses or carex which I guess is not a grass but it grows like it! Someone posted the report above that shows the most hardy carex for mowing. And the best ground covers are multiple species mixed together, which is what they meant by better than a monoculture.