Growing Daffodils, Show Results

Sunny and shade ground covers

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As least some of you know I have been growing and showing daffodils and iris grown on a relativity small city lot for 30 years.  I have always been a plant person and not a yard person.  I would not at presently invite any of you to visit my yard.

Now that I am retired I want to rectify that.

I have two Eco systems as my house faces south in the very hot delta city of West Memphis, AR.  My bloom season is 10 days to 3 weeks earlier than that of Memphis, Tn which sits on bluff.  The front yard receives a great deal of sun.  The backyard has two large pin oaks.  The bloom is later in the backyard.  The front yard is still 2/3 grass with weeds.  The backyard is mostly weeds.

My request is for information as to what kind of ground cover can be used in each Eco system that will permit daffodils to grow through them.

Jim Russell

12 comments for “Sunny and shade ground covers”

  1. Hi Jim:  I live in Maryville TN so I have a slightly different growing system than you but I also have very dry areas in my yard and I find that Vinca Minor grows in any part of my yard.  It’s a wonderful ground cover and my daffodils energy without any problem at all.  Another reason I love Vinca Minor is, in the spring it is covered with lovely little violet flowers.
    Just a suggestion for your problem.  I used to live in Jackson TN and had no problem growing VM there either.  It will grow anywhere!  haha
    Hope this might help you.
    Nancy Marrison’
    Maryville TN
    Where my yard is full of lovely beauties this time of year!!!!!
  2. My favorite summer/fall ground cover, when I get around to doing something other than pine straw mulch, is cosmos sulphureus.
    The roots aren’t invasive, and the flowers are most attractive, I think. It actually becomes something of a perennial for me, in beds that aren’t dug regularly, coming back just as the foliage of the daffodils is dying down.
    There are those who swear by the “Guardian’ marigolds for nematode control, with some documented success.
    It’s a tradeoff, isn’t it? You can’t have great daffodils, year after year, if the foliage isn’t allowed to finish its life cycle unimpeded in full sun.

    Loyce McKenzie

  3. 

     
    I prefer the weeds for a ground cover instead of the grasses:-))
     
    Folks won’t think you are insane if you turn more of the front, sunny area into a Strawberry bed for most of the early summer. It helps to give strawberries to your neighbors.
     
    Plant your daffodils in rows about 12 inches apart (30 CM) and in late fall come back and plant young strawberries in between each row of daffodils on 12 inch centers in these rows. About the time your daffodils are dying down you should begin to harvest Strawberries. These strawberries will also harvest the excess nitrogen and other fertilizer as they put down roots about 16″ deep or about the same area as where the daffodils are growing. You can keep strawberries alive all summer in your area with minimal water. Just enough for them to survive. Dig and divide and share the excess plants when you go back to dig your daffodils. Works better if you dig the whole bed.
     
    For shade you might consider annuals for summer butterfly gardens. But Ajuga, wandering Jew, Salvia would add some texture and color but I would lean heavily on a mulch ground cover around the trees as Pin Oak tree roots are going to be a “growing” problem each year. More so when you try to dig bulbs every three years or so.
     
    I like some of the newer “bunch grasses” a few of these scattered about give the illusion of more “grass” or stuff out there growing than there really is.
     
    The Datura and Brugmansia can be massive plants and stunning when in bloom but totally disappear with the first freeze. They are easy to dig around when re-digging daffodils.
     
    Think about ornamental peppers and a mix of edible peppers. Squash plants can be a beautiful accent plant. Ornamental gourds or mini pumpkins can be planted late season after you apply a heavy layer of mulch in the sunny areas and again you only need to water a small area around the main roots. You need to plant things that you don’t need to explain to your neighbors…. cucumbers and the newer leaf colored Sweet Potato plants are also great temporary ground covers.
     
    I started to just blow this topic off with a tongue in cheek one paragraph reply but this is ACTUALLY a really serious topic for those of us who may not have much space to plant our collection of daffodils and those people who MUST keep the appearances of a super tidy yard with all of the code and deed restrictions of our “modern society”. We also need to maintain our dormant daffodils so as not to encourage basil rot! Some of you all can add a LOT more to this topic! Keith Kridler Mt. Pleasant, Texas Currently violating multiple sections of our city code as far as “maintaining an attractive yard”.

  4. Hi Jim:

    I live in Maryville TN so I have a slightly different growing system than you but I also have very dry areas in my yard and I find that Vinca Minor grows in any part of my yard.  It’s a wonderful ground cover and my daffodils energy without any problem at all.  Another reason I love Vinca Minor is, in the spring it is covered with lovely little violet flowers.

    Just a suggestion for your problem.  I used to live in Jackson TN and had no problem growing VM there either.  It will grow anywhere!  haha

    Hope this might help you.
    Nancy Marrison’
    Maryville TN
    Where my yard is full of lovely beauties this time of year!!!!!

  5. Almost every year I dig a new bed for vegetables and that fall, without fail, the new bed gets planted in daffodils.  ;->  Over one series of sunny daffodil beds I have planted Flanders poppies, followed by the orange cosmos.  I love the poppies and they come back every year and reseed, but don't bloom for a very long season.  I finally have discovered, though, that a huge patch of orange cosmos, though providing lots of color until frost, is hard to clear off after frost (those little prickly seeds--ouch!).  Do the pink cosmos have the same prickly seeds?  I'm about to find out.  ;->  I also have some parsley and now cilantro established on some of the beds.  They also reseed and, when the parsley roots start to get too big, I just pull them out.  I have lots of weeds, too, but as long as the flowers are winning, I'm happy.

    I have been more pleased with using zinnias over daffs and have lots of zinnia seeds to plant this year over the newest bed.  They bloom until frost, are great for cut flowers, don't need summer watering (we get enough rain here), reseed (and I toss deadheaded ones underneath the plants as I snap them off), and there are newer mildew resistant varieties.  Also they come in just about any color or size you could want.  I belong to a CSA now for my vegetables, though I'll always plant a few.

    Becky Fox Matthews
    that daffy girl near Nashville (ah, now and then the capital 'n' key WILL still work)

  6. Hi:

    Just to let you know that Vinca minor is considered an exotic invasive throughout much of the country. You may not have problem with it in your yard, but the seed gets dispersed and it is easy to find patches of it in the National Forests and National Parks where it is most unwanted! Please don’t grow it if you don’t already have it; if you have it consider trying to get rid of it.
    This link has additional links to discussions of the problems by the Forest Service, Park Service, and the Nature Conservancy:
    TN lists it as a significant threat:
    Thanks!
    Debbie in NC where we are observing our first Invasive Plants Awareness Week from April 4-11!

  8. How about Dichondra?  I knew people who grew it in Redding, CA where the temps can reach 120 F.  It stays low and doesn’t have to be mowed.

    Colleen NE Calif

  10. Hello All,

    Like Keith I practice the Pannill system of “green mulch” (weeds).  I would not, though, grow strawberries which can be hosts to dipsaci ditylenchus – bulb and stem nematodes.  Go for the marigolds although the best sterilent amongst them is minutiae (grown by the Aztecs in their potato fields) which doesn’t have very attractive flowers.!

    Cheers,

    Peter (about one third through planting).


  11. Hi Peter,

    Where would one find minutiae.  I did a search, but didn’t find it?

     Colleen in NE Calif.


  12. If anyone is interested in Peter’s suggestion for tagetes minuta:

     It took a bit of sleuthing, but with your spelling and Google’s help I found it.

     http://www.seedsofchange.com/garden_center/product_details.aspx?item_no=PS16089

     See near bottom:

     http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1015/

     Next to last paragraph:

     http://www.dgsgardening.btinternet.co.uk/companion.htm

     Botanical info.

     http://www.hort.purdue.edu/newcrop/proceedings1993/v2-649.html

     Colleen


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