Native Lawns

FLAT SQUARE LAWNS ARE BORING!!!

• Add soil and contour or work existing soil and give the ground some interesting levels. That are still mower-friendly if you plan to mow.
• Add boulders to offer extra seating or a place to contemplate.
• Add obelisk(s) or a sculptural trellis to lift a trumpetvine or fall clematis from the sea of green
• Use tall ornamental grasses to artistically lead you from the one end of lawn to the other or to act as an interior green fence or structural accents. In a sea of green grasses, tufts of blue fescue or little bluestem can be powerful in drifts or as stunning artful accents.
• Add small spring and fall bulbs Crocus (spring/fall), dwf daffodils, species tulips, muscari, snowdrops to warm-season lawns to bring color to the dormant grasses.
• Include wildflowers or preferably a single species to dress up a wild lawn (California Poppy, Buckwheats-Eriogonums),
• Naturalize with shrubs like rabbitbrush, manzanita, sages (including salvias), yucca, grolow or rocky mt. sumac. These work best in the unmowed lawn or grouped within lawn left as unmowed islands.

Here are some mixes that have worked well in Durango:

BUFFALO/BLUE GRAMA This mix will work well up to 8,000 ft elevation. This mix will not need soil amendments, fertilizing, mowing is minimal if at all and will look great with just the occasional watering once established. Blue grama germinates first, buffalo fills in over time. Buffalograss and blue grama lawns can remain green for weeks without watering, even during the hottest summer weather. Because the window of green is pretty small (90 days or less) adding other plants will keep this lawn interesting.
Bouteloua gracilis Blue Grama
Buchloe dactyloides Buffalograss

SHORT NATIVE MIX This mix offers a soft look when left unmowed. Wildflowers and shrubs like rabbitbrush, sage, grolow sumac, wild rose, yucca and manzanita look great growing out of it. An annual fall mowing is all that is needed for maintenance.

Festuca ovina Sheep fescue
Bouteloua curtipendula Side Oats Grama
Koeleria cristata Junegrass
Bouteloua gracilis Blue Grama
Festuca arizonica Arizona Fescue
Festuca longifolia Hard Fescue

SHADY DRY NATIVE LAWN
This can be a “patch’ in shady bluegrass areas.
Festuca ovina Sheep fescue
Festuca longifolia Hard fescue
Festuca rubra Creeping Red fescue

DRYLAND MIX
This mix can be used in the home landscape as an ornamental meadow, wildflowers complement and naturalize easy. Can be mowed high to maintain a lawn-like look, when desired. Left unmowed at season’s end offers many colorful foliages and ornamental seedheads.

Bouteloua curtipendula Side Oats Grama
Bouteloua gracilis Blue Gram
Stipa hymenioides Indian Rice Grass
Hilaria jamesii Galleta Grass
Festuca ovina Sheep Fescue
Adropogon scoparius Little Bluestem