Last year I planted Corsican Mint as a lawn substitite. We live on a slope are are hoping to get rid of the grass completely, as it is hard to mow. The Corsican mint is flourishing here in our woodlands (shady) Pac NW setting. It stayed green all winter, even through freezing temps. And it never needs to be mowed. Yeah! We grew the mint from seed in 4" pots and divided them into little 1" clumps, given that we needed several hundred pots (our lawn is huge), and buying all of those pots would have cost us thousands. The seed was inexpensive. We planted the clumps 12" apart and by the end of summer, most of it was filled in. The only problem is that weeds and grass can pop through the mint, although I think this problem will be aleviated as the mint forms that lush dense carpet, as it is doing now. Corsican Mint is great for foot traffic, and it smells amazing when you walk on it. The tiny scale is gorgeous, like something out of a fairy tale. We have lots of neighborhood cats and I thought they would be attracted to the smell and eat it up. However, we have not run into that problem.

The vinca could work but you'll find it will spread and cover much more satisfactorily if it gets regular water. Being a PNW resident myself, I know we tend not to be short of rain for a large portion of the year, but summers are notably dry. And tree cover can prevent rainfall getting through easily. A number of the other suggestion made are less suitable, simply because they they are herbaceous or die to the ground in winter. When not present, weeds will appear (weeds grow here even in winter) and then you have deal with the issue of cleaning out the bed at least on an annual basis. And some of these tend to be less adaptable to dry shade, which can be a very limiting condition. My suggestion would have been Euphorbia robbiae, which is both evergreen, extremely tolerant of dry shade and a nicely aggressive spreader. But the vinca should work......and most of it was free :-) Just keep it properly watered until well established.

Bill, 6b isnt too bad, the data they collected included the major freezes of the 1980's so that probably lowered your zone from a 7a to a 6b. But winters like this year is what kind of evens things out a little bit since it has been a very mild winter! We got down to 13F here which actually is considered a pretty normal lowest temperature for the average mild winter, but the duration of warm weather this winter is something I haven't seen here in many years. I think that if you get colder than your zone more than 2 times in a decade, then you shouldn't be classified in that zone. After looking at NYC records, its clear that it does actually fit that definition as a zone 7b which I thought was suprising. And as for Miami, the city center definitely wont go below 35F so its a solid 10b. The more rural areas outside the city did get a freeze during that bitter 2010 cold spell, but the coastal areas of Miami only went down to the mid 30s. Florida seems like it got a bit colder with this new zone map, one of a few places that showed cooling with this zone map. But the major cities of Southeast Florida (Fort Lauderdale down to Miami and points south) is all a zone 10b now and in the 1990 map, only Miami was in a small pocket of zone 10b. No Problem Joey! Randy, I always thought that the USDA zone map should be taken as just a guide. It gives people a good idea of what kind of climate they have, and I think the zone maps are really intended for those gardeners that dont really know a lot about their climate. Gardeners like all of us are aware that the zones dont tell even half the story. Minimal temperatures during the winter are probably the most important factor for most plant's survival, especially in temperate climates, but its not the only factor. And once you get past zone 9a, I think that the duration of heat and freezes is a lot more important than minimal temperatures. Its the same reason why a zone 10b in Miami can grow a ton more tropicals than a zone 11 in Malibu! And a zone 7b in New York and a zone 7b in North Carolina are 2 totally different climates. You wont see live oaks and spanish moss lining streets here in NYC, but you might see something like that in a zone 7b in the southern states. And It seems to me like some areas are a bit more detailed than others with this map. I see a lot of detail from this map in my area, but Northern Florida and Georgia dont have as much detail it seems. For example, I would definitely consider Savannah Georgia and all of Coastal Georgia a zone 9a, but on this map about half of Georgia's coastline including Savannah is only a zone 8b. And I think that some of the more rural parts of Northern Florida are a bit too warm on this map. -Alex

Just over 60 days now. These pics are from a couple days ago. Mowing about every 4 days. I'm applying urea at .5 lb N / 1000 sq ft weekly. I also put alfalfa on it last night. I had it in my head that 10 lbs / 1000 sq ft was the prescribed dosage, but then read an alfalfa post by dchall saying that 20, 30, even 40 lbs per 1000 sq ft is good. So I'll grab a couple more bags this week and throw them down. I'm pretty happy with it at this point. There will be work to be done in the spring, but it's 100% better than what I had when I started.