I'm also a little surprised that you're having trouble by the sea. The only place I've ever seen dymondia look really lush and good is by the beach in Oxnard where they get lots of morning fog.

The summer heat killed off 1/3 of my Dymondia this year (with regular watering) and now the white mold has come back again for a third year and will take another 1/3 in the next few months.

I agree with Pink, this stuff isn't drought tolerant. I planted my backyard with it a few years ago in the hopes it would be a ground cover replacement for grass, but no luck. It suffers in the Los Angeles summer and is prone to disease in the winter.

Bummed out.........

Hi. I started this thread a while back, and I finally gave up and replanted part and paved part our dymondia patch. Some thoughts:

1) Dymondia is drought tolerant. It just looks terrible in high heat.

2) Dymondia grows best with about 6-8 hrs of sun here in So Cal. Probably more is fine in more northern climates

3) The best dymondia I've seen is in Oxnard by the beach where they have fog every night and a heavy marine layer every morning. The temperature rarely gets over 80. I saw several houses with nice thick dymondia carpets there. I've never seen nice dymondia in anywhere else.

Overall, I think it is a poor choice for ground cover for hot places

A quick follow up on the slimy white mold that occurs with too much moisture: ddhort was right, pulling out the affected areas does seem to spread the problem.

I have left it alone this winter and the mold has spread much less.

Thanks for the insight.

I'm in the process of planting app 700 sq. feet as a replacement for my front lawn. My house faces west, get 7-8 hours of sun then the house will shade it. Reading some of the comments here have me a little concerned. Their is on home in our area that's had it for a few years now and it's always healthy and beautiful ! Anyway wish me luck, this has been a lot of work removing lawn, amending soil, tilling soil, planting 2,800 individual plants !

Sparkle6789: What area do you live in? I'm looking to plant it in my backyard in Belmont, CA in the next two weeks with subsurface irrigation. I'd love to show my husband a house who has it instead of a lawn.

I'm in Modesto, CA about 1.5 hrs away. Mine is 95% planted at a spacing of 6.5 inches on center. Not much to see right now. If you want a great example there is a house at 909 Brady Ave in Modesto that has a huge Dymondia lawn replacement it's awesome You can use google maps and get and idea, but nothing like seeing it in person.

Thank you. I looked on Google Maps and it looks nice. We decided to put in a subsurface irrigation system also.

Good luck with that !!

It is not too much or too little water! The whole cover will be dead. There are insects that suck the sap from the leaves I found locusts on mine and since then I regularly spray them . Problem solved!

I just copied this from my most reliable plant reference, San Marcos Growers. Maybe this will help some of you...
"Dymondia margaretae (Silver Carpet) - This is a slowly spreading, very flat (just a few inches tall at best) groundcover with 1-2 inch long narrow leaves, that are a gray-green on top with white tomentosa beneath. Though flat to the ground, the white undersides are exposed to view as the leaf margins edges roll up and inward, particularly, when grown dry and thus giving the plant an appearance of being variegated. Small yellow daisy flowers bloom amongst the foliage in summer. Plant in full sun to light shade in a well-drained soil. This plants grows rapidly with irrigation, but it has deep succulent roots and can be very drought tolerant, though notably slower growing. It is hardy to about 25-30 degrees F. About the only things that this plant does not tolerate well is a heavy or otherwise non-draining soil and gophers. People that have problems with this plant are often overwatering it or have it planted in soils that do not drain adequately. It also does best along the coast as growth slows to a crawl in summer heat inland and then springs back to life with cooler days in fall.?San Marcos Growers

I have a very large area covered with dymondia.

I put out snail pellets and the next day there were about 50 dead snails

We live along the coast in So. Cal. We're very disappointed in our 2 dymondia lawns. They were doing well until the first rain this winter when we noticed fuzzy white mold on the leaves that would then dry and blow away. What a hassle it has been. The patches have spread even though we are treating it with a recommended fungicide. Every one gives us different information. Some say more water, some say less. Sigh

Hi Rose. I started this thread a while back, and eventually just gave up and paved the small area where the dymondia was.

Whatever anyone tells you, dymondia is not well adapted to high heat. Every time the temp went 92+ it withered. It wants very little water, but it likes the cool moist nights on the coast, if you don't over water. Use a soil probe and only water when it's dry.

The only place I have ever seen it grow well is right near the beach in Oxnard, where every night is a dense fog and temps rarely exceed 80 in the summer. Several houses I've seen up there have lush green carpets.

Also sandy/loam soil is best. It really hated my clay soil. I mean seriously.

Good luck. If it fails, my advice is something in the thyme or mint families. Lots of good choices there

Look into Lippia as a lawn substitute. Only drawback for some people is bees (and welcomed for just that reason by many), but it uses 60% less water than grass, stays tight, can be walked on (mow the flowers off once in a while). There's a hybrid called Kurapia that's grown in sod form by Delta Bluegrass in central. The species is native to California, among other diverse areas. Can be invasive in some locales, so do your research. http://www.deltabluegrass.com/home 

Thanks for the comments, everyone; however, we cannot afford to rip out a front and back dymondia lawn and start over with something else. We have to make the dymondia work. DWP would not less us plant buffalo grass. That would have been perfect. Their reason was that even though it is a drought tolerant grass, planting it would give people the message that grass is still okay to plant. Go figure!

I chose to treat the Dymondia problem as a fungus. After a couple of years of 2 to 3 applications per year the symptoms finally went away so I believe my assumption was a correct one. Treated with Headway from Do My Own Pest Control.

I've heard similar solutions from others. Thanks for weighing in.

Will heed your advice, ddhort(z6VA), thanks so much!

I live in Long Beach, CA and my dymondia lawn has been going strong for 6 years. It needs well drained soil otherwise it will have fungus issues. However- the biggest mistake people make is to use high nitrogen fertilizer. This will absolutely rot the roots and you will be left with a layer of mush. My whole yard gets an application of compost tea in March. Dymondia is not well suited for the heat in the inland areas and the

Thanks and lucky you! Ours continues to die in many areas. We live on the coast and have clay soil, unfortunately, that we amended, but maybe not enough. Sigh:( What do you fertilize with, besides the compost tea?

Looks like I have this now in Moorpark CA. It was doing great until we finally got some rain this past weekend. I will try the Daconil, but what mix to use? They list different ratios and of course ground cover is not covered. Im guessing the shrub ratio.

Affected areas are in the low spots and shady spots, so it makes sense extra water and cooler days may have tipped the fungus

I live in Burbank. Have about 2,000 sf covered with dymondia. The soil is a bit of a challenge (silty/clayey soil), even with amendments. From planting a grid of them at roughly 12" on center, it took around 8 months for the area to be fully covered. It looked great - until I started to have a grub infestation. Dymondia and other plants started to mysteriously die out. I had either dead patches, circles, or these irregular travel patterns/paths that in hindsight were indicative of grubs having a merry day taking a stroll through my backyard and eating away on roots. I thought it had to do with irrigation and fungus, varied the pattern of irrigation, used anti-fungus treatments, observed areas receiving full sun or that were shaded... it all didn't really matter. I then so happened to pull out one of the dead plants and found within a 12" circle at least 15 grubs. I then checked out the areas of dying Dymondia and quickly found more grubs. Turns out that Dymondia's vertical white root stems are rather thick & juicy when compared to normal grass, so grubs would feast on my lush Dymondia garden and ignore other plans/grasses with different kind of roots. Sevin insecticide does the trick with the grubs closer to the surface, but my silty-clayey doesn't allow for the water to penetrate deep so grubs deeper in the soil are not so much affected. Major pain in the butt. Looking right now in the direction of using nematodes (trying to leave a few months between applying Sevin and spreading nematodes).

And to Emil: Spike the patch with a pitch fork. Lifting the ground up so it looks bumpy. Insert the tongs about 8". Then apply your 'Bayer 3 in one' spray. Use twice the recommended amount. Grubs will then be gone.

To improve your clay: mulch with 'redwood nitro, fines". Water in hard spray, so nitro gets under the lifted patches. Adding perlite and vermiculite to the fines also is good. Buy the 2 items in 4 sq foot bags ($25 ea). You'll need about 1 ea. bag per 300 sq ft. Red sand is also good. A mulch containing all of these am amendments can be found at a good soil supply. Add a nessary what ever is missing. Apply on top to level surface. Dymondia will grow through 11/2" of mulch.

I am a landscape designer in San Diego.

We used dymondia sparingly in our designs because an entire lawn of dymondia is expensive risky and unpredictable.

Also not very interesting from a design standpoint to plant an entire lawn of it . The beauty of dymondia is how it looks texturally when it is juxtaposed against other colors and textures . We use it in cracks here and there and around outcroppings so if any plugs perish it isn't a big deal to pull and replace..The Getty Gardens are a great example of effective restrained use of dymondia.

For a drought tolerant lawn that is great to frolic on and pet friendly ...

install UC Verde Buffalo Grass plugs, cut it once a year in March /April and enjoy .

SUBSURFACE Netafim irrigation is worth the money in the long run because you are not spraying the air and losing water to evaporation.

Our clients love it !

Also keep your Garden Organic!

Chemical fertilizers and fungicides just quick fix kill and simultaneously trash your soil microbes. Be patient and don't kill your soil with all those toxic chemicals!

Dr Earth products build your soil and are now carried at HOME depot !

Wow, glad I googled this subject and read the whole thread. I have a front lawn I'm pulling out and want to plant Cal Natives and have an area in the front of the house for a small sitting area. I wanted to use decomposed granite, but thought it might be too expensive for the area and had seen dymondia used in LA gardens and yards. Now I realize if I planted this as a low traffic ground cover, I would be very disappointed. The front gets afternoon sun and can get pretty toasty in the summer. I may need to revisit the option of DC. I love this plant and will use it as an accent and not a ground cover.

There is a product called Green Cure, a fungicide, that was recommended to kill the fungus that attacks Dimondia. In Orange, Calif., it is sold at Orange County Farm Supply on Chapman Ave., just east of the 57 freeway. Have not had to use it yet, so can't vouch for it's effectiveness. My Dimondia gets full sun and weekly watering except during rainy season: this winter so far has had ample rain in Garden Grove. my soil is a nice loam. The Dimondia is very hardy, spreads fast and can crowd out weeds well especially in the sun: a partially shaded area encourages grass to grow in it but am going to try Amaze if I can determine that the Dimondia is resistant to it.

Ok, read the entire thread and not one mention of my issue with Dymondia....mushrooms (which I guess IS a fungus) popped up over night! Can anyone tell me the best way to get rid of them? I'm worried if I try and pick them they will spread.

We had those, too. They showed up in the winter with the rain. Took them out. Haven't had a problem since. Crab grass continues to be a problem, however. It grows right over the dymondia. BTW, our dymondia kicked in after 4 years of so, so, looks. It is very lush in the winter, but dryish in the summer. We're gonna hang in there with it and see what happens. We still feel it's not all that it's cracked up to be. It still can't beat the beauty of a lush lawn. Sigh.

Rose Ochoa, thanks for your response. Exactly how did you take them out? Thanks. FOUR YEARS...wow.

My dymondia has been a labor of love.

1. Nematodes got rid of the grubs.

2. I find it does better in the shade of my large Camphor trees.

3. Success is in the preparation. You really need to get rid of all grass and weed seeds before you plant the dymondia. Good soil preparation is the key.

4. I have to constantly weed these plants. After much research I just started using a pre-emergent herbacide (40 lb bag for $100) called Pendulum. I will follow the schedule of application 3 times a year which I read about earlier in this thread. I will let you know how it goes further down the road. I hate to use chemicals but I think I had no choice.

5. My opinion is that it is a lovely ground cover (lots of work) provided the conditions are right. It is definitely not for everybody.

Tibor

Yes, it hates the hot summer sun. It dries up quickly and needs constant watering. Defeats the purpose of getting it in the first place. It's beautiful and rich looking in the winter. Weeds are also a problem. Requires constant weeding. We didn't know what we were getting into. Sigh

Michael, we took out the mushrooms by simply plucking them out by hand. They didn't spread at all. We may see them again this year if it rains enough, but otherwise not a problem.

Trust the San Marcos site for info. I planted 3-2" pots in stones. They get almost no supplemental water and have spread like crazy. I live in Oak Park (by Agoura) which is pretty close to surface of the sun temperatures. If you have heavy soil (clay) it will hold onto water much longer. My suggestion is deep water every two weeks if it gets really hot. I haven't done that and while mine doesn't look particularly great it keeps chugging along.

Well, that's the problem. It looks good for 4 months, just okay for 4 months, and scrawny for 4 months. Not acceptable, but it does keep spreading.

I have two dymondia lawns so I have some experience with this.

Pendulum 2g $$$$ is the only herbicide that won't kill dymondia. Fusilade kills it even though my specialty nursery said it would be fine.

I heavily hand weeded the first year. The second year I applied the granular corn gluten. Yuck - Gets gummy when watered and stays bright orange and sits on top of soil for several months. (You might want to try the powder or liquid version of the corn gluten pre-emergent. It's non-toxic and they think it might be good for the soil too!)

Not sure if the corn stuff helped kill weed seeds because I was getting far fewer weeds anyways as the dymondia plugs filled in. (And, I really didn't see much difference in the area of dymondia where I didn't use the corn gluten.) I hand pulled the few weeds that came up for about the next four months.

Now my lawns are about 1.5 years old and dense and rarely get a weed. I hand dig any weeds, taking the time to get the root out, when I see one.

For irrigation, I use only two Hunter MP3000 sprinkler heads for each 15'x15' square lawn. They are positioned diagonally across from each other. Perfect and even coverage!!! By at Home Depot and they simply insert into standard sprinkler bodies!!!

These two lawns are right above a lake in San Luis Obispo and the dymondia love the morning fog and the sunshine. I water for 20 minutes once a week in the hottest part of the summer. I have to be careful not to over water other times of the year.

Hope this helps. Absolutely love the Hunter MPseries for lawn irrigation!

Barbara SLO,Ca

Wayne Terrain's comments were very helpful to me. I live in the San Diego area about a mile from the coast. I planted 1000 sq ft of dymondia as plugs starting in March this year (2017). It is filling in very nicely. But it hasn't been without challenges. The first was little snails. Sluggo Plus took care of that. Then the 'white death' started in places. At first, two or three weekly applications of Daconil arrested the development of that. Then as summer turned to fall, I came out one morning to see a white fuzz wide spread in several areas. This was accompanied with slime and white dead leaves. With a little research I came to the conclusion that it was sclerotinia sclerotiorum. I could be wrong, however I was able to eradicate it by doing the following: I took my little shop vac and vacuumed the slime out of the affected area. Then having bought Daconil concentrate, I diluted 2oz Daconil concentrate with 24oz water, then set my sprayer to 4oz/gal and sprayed the area. I also set up a squeeze bottle to the same concentration. (What was left in the sprayer I diluted 1oz per 1qt water). I use this to spot treat. I did this daily; vacuum and spray. It's been about a week and I no longer see fuzzy white things in the dymondia, and no more slime and no more white dead leaves. There are plenty of bald spots but I'm trusting they'll fill back in.

Aloha from Hawaii! We have many “microclimates” and soil types here in our islands. Microclimates vary from wet to arid and my island has 10 different types of soil. This makes us especially aware of proper growing conditions of plants we choose to use in our yards. Research is a must! Dymondia likes sandy, rocky, well-draining soil. Heavy clay and compacted soil would not yield good results. The first 2 months after planting dymondia, it is important to give ample water, as roots must grow and dig in to develop its water-holding capacity. Our motto around here: “Right plant, right place.” Hope this helps.

I have Dymodia I wish it was greener but I learned to like it it as it is. It is drought tolorant but almost everyone I know says it is not because theres died. The first two years it is hard to grow until it fills in you have to water it alot it does like water and needs it to form this web like coverage. Once it grows in, it holds water in the soil and only needs water three to 4 times a week for about 3-5 minutes depending on your sprinklers and location. In the winter it will molt mainly in areas that are fairly shaded, if it has a western exposure it should do fairly well, Do not water in the winter unless the ground gets really dry and there is not rain in the forecast. It does not like it's feet to be wet just like many tropical plants. In Thousand Oaks CA where I live I have trucked in a dump truck full well drained soil for my topical plants over the years prior. The soil here is very clay like in my backyard with an eastern exposure I have less of that well drained soil so for the winter rain is your enemy causing molting. Don't worry it all grows back quickly in the spring maybe it is it's way of mowing it self down or thining so it does not get to high.

As far as general care I have had some luck with fish fertilizer mixed in with miricle grow but do not use any kind of pellet fertilizer with Dymodia it burns back quite a bit even after brisk watering the pellets cannot get below the Dymodia Matt and burn when on the surface of the plant. I highly recommend it in the medium where it gets lots of sun and reflective heat from the street and the side walk. I also removed all the grass on my property, I think if you get it completly filled in you will like it and will save a huge amount of money each month on your water bill. I have 275 palms some are rare and its is a very wet tropical yard and by adding Dymodia gave me a great subtropical yard with a huge water savings.

Watering every day is the worst thing you can do!! If the soil is damp leave it alone.

Agrifoss fungicide is the answer. 2 oz per gallon. Spray with hand sprayer gettin in and around leaves and soil. Every other day for 3 days.

You can try spotting but it’s best to do the entire patch.

Argifoss can be purchased on Amazon.

Agri-fos is the correction spelling

Wayne Terrain - I've had my dymondia lawn for about 5 years, doing rather other than it's looking a little clumpy. Does dymondia need to be thinned at all

Clumps can be thinned no problem. Grab on and pull out by the roots. Using a very thin trowel, push in deep and rock the trowel to loosen the soil. You will hear roots breaking which is good for clumping.

I am in South Bay San Diego 3/4 miles from the water . i have a friend 1 mile from me who planted a small patch of dymondria on a walkway , with pavers. It has spread rapidly,. She just cuts the pieces that grow too far off the walkway and lays them down where she wants it to spread. Her original two feet , now covers eight feet of walkway through her garden now and it tries to grow over the little brick barrier. She lets go over in some places and she is letting it spread onto a larger square area that gets moderate foot traffic. .

i think an advantage is that it never gets waterlogged from a lot of rain. Lol !!! we dont know what that is.🌧 Ha ha!!!

From everything i have read here, i may be in a good area for dynondria. I am near a bay ( i noticed one guy said the best he has seen was on the ocean in Oxnard. ) It s rarely hot here and i have morning sun in my front yard for about six hours then shade from my two story house. .

When the inland San Diego temperatures are 90-110 degrees , our temp is in the 70s or 80s... sometimes over 90. it is very dry... we are a desert ( 11inchs of rain if we are lucky. ) But being on the coast, we dont have the desert heat.

My soil is Ok.., dry and sandy. . it needs supplements for most things, but the dymondia might like it. Wish me luck.!

Good luck 😊

I recently installed 10 flats of dyamondia prior to reading this post. After 2 weeks half of the lawn has brown fat leaves that are white on bottom the rest has white thin leaves that are curled up. I realized that I did not initially water it enough. Are all of the plants with brown leaves dead? I have clay soil that I ammended.

Keep Dymondia pretty much wet for the first couple of months.
Clay soil is not acceptable in any form.

Sandy potting & rich in nutrient’s type soil to a depth of at least 12” will start your crop. Dymondia will grow right over solid cement once established.

Sorry for loosing your flats. Start digging.

Wayneterrain

I have a 200 sq foot section of Dymondia for about two years that replaced a lawn. At one point it looked pretty nice, but now it is a weedy mess. I live in San Diego two miles from the coast. I water twice a week for 10 min. The lawn was removed and replaced with mulch for a couple of years before the Dymondia was planted. Several inches of topsoil were added to already amended soil before the Dymondia was planted. Although it seems like it is in the right growing conditions, it has been a labor of love. I am pulling weeds manually every couple of weeks at least in the summer months. The weeds include oxalis, spurge, crabgrass and miscellaneous others including some I can not identify. Reading through this thread and based on other research I have done online, it looks like my best option is Pendulum 2G. Before I buy a 40 pound bag of chemicals for my little yard, I wanted to see if there are any other suggestions. Thank you