I went to the Central Velley last summer for the first time (Fresno area) and I too was blown away by the incredible Crape's growing all over the place. The entire region is irrigated, even the strip of land between the local interstate lanes! It was all very lush and yards were filled with everything from palms to paper birch trees! Yes..paper birch in Fresno. But, in those areas that no longer received irrigation...forget about it...not a green thing in sight...totally dead. I guess unlimited sun + unlimited irrigation + great soil = grow anything you want.

I keep going back and forth as I watch my ground covers spread. I do not like the "empty" look of nothing or the dead, messy look of mulch. I have a perennial vinca vine and ajuga. They just finished their bloom cylce. I loved the blue flowers among my hosta. The creeping jenny is just getting ready to bloom. It keeps moving toward the grass away from my woodland garden. At my place the ground covers compete more with the ferns, bleeding hearts and astilbe than they do with the hosta. The hosta aren't bothered but the others struggle mightily if a ground cover gets too close. They are not a huge issue to keep back. Once twice a season I go around and remove any invaders from under my hosta canopies. Once the hosta come in it is too dark under them for my ground cover to be happy. I have had LOV and snow on the mountain deep in the back of my woodland hosta gardens for over 10 years and never had a problem. They seem to be creeping now and I find myself pulling them up but I have so many seedlings to edit out it is all just part of the process. Wild violets love my gardens and I have all colors. It the spring they are very welcome. About now they are getting pretty large and the rain is usually at a premium so I pull them as I go. I prefer to think of "editing" vs weeding. People see my garden and imagine I do nothing but garden but they are wrong. I enjoy and hour or so a day. Some days when I am "painting" re-arranging I spend longer. This Lamium has me intrigued. I wonder if it would grow for me?

Hi Michiele, Landscaping around a pool that is in full sun, or at least in lots and lots of sun, can be very challenging. Often the heat that reflects from the pool and the pool deck are very hard on plants. When you are landscaping near a pool area, I think grass is always best because it can take the most abuse, from being walked on, having beach balls bounce through it, etc. To keep weeds to a minimum, put down a good quality woven landscape fabric, plant your grasses and add some mulch. When choosing a mulch, it is often better to use some sort of stone like river rock or lava rock because bark mulches tend to blow into the pool. Interplanting a taller ground cover like ornamental grass with a shorter ground cover can be difficult. Creeping ground covers like Asian Jasmine or Boston Ivy may tend to 'climb' up the clumps of grass. If you have a taller ornamental grass, then a shorter ground cover may get too shaded by the taller grasses and not fill in as well as you would like. You might try ice plant or creeping sedum. They also are creepers more than vining climbers so they would be easier to maintain. Both are very tough and can handle the reflected heat from the pool's concrete or stone surround. If you are going to have a taller form of ornamental grass, you could use ornamental blue fescue, fiber optic grass or blue-eyed grass as the shorter plant to fill in around the larger ones. It can be hard to combine ornamental grasses with shorter ground covers underneath them because the shorter plants can be overwhelmed by the larger grasses. A mixed planting of ornamental grasses, creeping groundcovers and dwarf shrubs can be used quite effectively if the plants are in scale with one another. You might go to the website for High Country Gardens (I think it is www.highcountrygardens.com) and look at their ground covers. They have a lot of uncommon plants that are suited to tough conditions. Good luck, Dawn

They both bloom equally I would give anything to get a holed of Flower Carpet Pink again. Have not been able to find it anywhere. In my yard it never behaved like ground cover. All branches where held up off the ground. Once established she was very heathy. She stood about 3 feet high and a 4 to 5 foot circle covered all season with loosely double flowers from head to toe. Never a problem with her flowers except as with all roses the JBs. So I guess you might say that I loved FCP. Pink Supreme is gorgeous and very healthy. Always full of flowers they are brighter than FCP. The growth habit is harder to predict. It is mostly out on the ground first than the laterals head up. I have learned not to prune an errant cane unless I would like a hole bunch more. I have five of these and for what ever the reason (only the rose knows) they all grow differently. Two have remained little round ground covers for 3 years in a row now maybe 2 feet high and 2 feet around. One is hugh 4 feet high and six feet around. Two grow like flower carpet scarlet if you have seen that one. It is also spectacular but very large. So with the music of Jeopardy playing in my head. If I was forced to choose it would be FCP. Only because the growth was more predictable.