Steep Are The Ivy Covered Walls

Low-maintenance drought-resistant plants that stabilise the soil and evergreens to take the force out of downpours, particularly in winter, are what is needed. By understanding the nature of sunny slopes, dry, hot, baked soil can be harnessed for plants that appreciate this, including amaryllis, bearded iris, hardy cyclamen and nerines. Clearly, plants that require constant moisture and which have tender leaves that shed moisture readily are best avoided.

On the plus side, well-drained ground greatly reduces the incidence of root disease — and even weeds are held back. Where space and resources allow, a slope can be terraced into a series of level beds retained by low walls, gabions or sleepers.

Terraces allow the use of trailing plants to sprawl over edges, while below and against the retaining walls the microclimate suits tender plants such as helianthemum and even the more robust cacti and succulents agave for example , which are borderline hardy at best. Terraces are also much easier to maintain. Banks and steeper slopes are often on poor and sandy soils and lack organic matter.

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Similarly, post-planting watering is best done with a very gentle sprinkler, although on a small scale plastic bags filled with water can be placed next to individual plants, a pin prick being made at the base to gently soak the root zone. The best plants to grow. Evergreen; violet flowers June-Oct, compact with glossy red-edged foliage. Evergreen; deep pink flowers late spring-early summer; bronze leaves. Evergreen aromatic foliage, white flowers with a maroon blotch in early summer. Evergreen, bushy, spikes of pale purple flowers June-July. Evergreen, forms mat 15cm 6in high.

Evergreen white woolly foliage, small pink flowers. Evergreen mat-forming conifer with spiky grey-green foliage. Maybe put up a bit of a rustic fence to delineate the area even just wooden fence corners help delineate the area and keep the borders carefully trimmed. Cover it with ivy. It will take some time to grow and spread unless you get lots but it will choke out the weeds.

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Many of the yards in our neighborhood are quite steep and a number of folks have put in rock gardens with succulents interspersed. They're quite lovely and at least in Georgia, home of gigantic invasive weeds the only maintenance they require is weeding a couple times a year.

Plant with Milkweed and other pollinator plants to help the monarch population. The traditional way of getting rid of weeds in a reasonably permanent way is to cover the area with heavy black plastic for a season or two. After that point, you should be able to plant ground cover with reasonable success. It can be done surprisingly quickly. Remember to wear good eye and ear protection. I'd plant hearty groundcovers such as periwinkle, stonecrop, sedum or creeping jenny. I have all four on my property, and I have had some measure of success with choking out the weeds and not having to mow with all of these.

Also, once established can take drought, sun and shade quite well. Oh jesus, don't cover it with ivy, the stuff is an absolute bloody menace, and it will be ripping apart the mortar in your house and guttering before you know it and it's practically impossible to eradicate. I have a very sloping block, and I Nth the use of Jutte. This process will involve a little bit of work now, but then you will be set for a long time. Step 1 , spray the current weeded hillside with RoundUp.

Use a strong concentration, you want to be sure to kill everything. It takes about a week. RoundUp has a far scarier reputation than it deserves, don't be afraid. It needs photosynthesis to work, so don't do it on cloudy or rainy days.

Steep ivy covered rock face and tower on Bamburgh Castle in Stock Photo: - Alamy

Step 2 Buy the Jutte matting. Generally comes in 25 metre rolls 75 feet or thereabouts. You can also get pegs for it, which I would recommend given your slope. The reason you buy jutte not regular weedmats is that it's biodegradable and unless plastic weedmat will not create a nightmare for you down the road.

It will last between years depending on thickness and local weather, and when it dies it will enrich the soil. You can buy slitted and nonslitted varieties for planting. Roll it out, covering your now-dead hillside with slight overlaps to prevent gaps. Regular pegging will stop it sliding away. Step 3 Stake the hillside. Buy some small wooden stakes, and nail them across your hillside in horizontal lines at regular intervals. Run wire or twine I recommend twine; again, it's biodegradeable so you never have to worry about picking it up at a later date between them.

Between one to three lines. This will stop your mulch from sliding down the hill. Space the "rows" about anywhere from feet, depending on how steep the slope is. You can also buy netting that you can use, and you don't need multiple lines. Just make sure it's not plastic.

You will regret anything plastic. Step 4 Mulch the hillside. I don't recommend rubber mulch, it will never break down. Consider just regular woodchips, or pinebark. Regular woodchip mulch will enrich the soil as it breaks down, but it will also suck up nitrogen from the soil in the process, making it harder for weeds to come up under it. Pine bark doesn't do this, and is typically darker in colour so you may prefer for cosmetic reasons.

It also breaks down much more slowly. It is often a little pricier. You can get very cheap if not practically free woodchips if you get in contact with local tree lopping companies. They are always looking to get rid of the stuff. Much cheaper than buying from landscape supply places. If you have no luck with the first one, just keep calling round. Could well be cheaper where you are. One weekend morning to RoundUp.

The better part of one saturday to roll and stake the jutte it's not heavy at all, think like a blanket , one full weekend day to lay the mulch, depending on how far you have to travel from pile to slope, and if you have any help. You will, obvs, need a wheelbarrow and shovel for that part. So think about two days reasonably hard work.

It will be painful doing it, and feel slow - but if you do this, you won't have to do anything but the most desultory maintenance for many years. Note that weedmat obviously only stops weeds coming up through the ground.

Germany, Rhineland-Palatinate, Mesenich, On the Mosel steep path, house wall with ivy and geraniums

Seeds blown on the wind will land on top, and will eventually grow. If you buy the slitted jutte, I heartily encourage you to plant that slope up, with trees over ground cover preferably. They won't have competition from weeds so will grow much better, and they will be established before the weeds get a chance, and then there will not be enough light for most weeds. Wow, somehow I've been living in a cave and unaware of the hatred for ivy.

Yes, it grows and it can spread, but a little bit of work keeps it under control.

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Pachysandra is another option, but even that requires a bit of attention. Thanks so much, everyone! Let me clarify a few things about my situation that I probably should have included in my original question, and respond to some of the suggestions so far. The slope is directly on the side of our house, with no plateau at the top from which to stand to hold a hover mower or line trimmer. When I've hit it with a string trimmer before, I've just walked up from the bottom, but if I neglect it for just a week or two, it's a damned jungle.

I think because it's so right up against the house, trees are right out.