The Downside To Growing Ground Covers In Your Yard You Might Want To Consider

Ground covers offer some amazing perks that make them a fantastic addition to your gardens and lawns. They attract pollinators, deter weeds from growing in the precious real estate reserved for your plants, and some of them even reward you with colorful foliage and flowers to cover major problem areas in your lawn. But ground covers also come with a lurking downside, and it's not just the occasional problem of invasiveness. It may be difficult to detect, but some of the harmless-looking ground covers can easily become perfect habitats for harbingers of Lyme disease: Ticks.

Ticks are blood-sucking pests that can be more than just annoying — they also carry a number of pathogens inside them. So, if you thought you were safe from dangerous tick bites as long as you did not go camping somewhere deep in the heart of the Amazon, you're in for a mild shock. With the kind of shade and moisture that ground covers provide, these blood-sucking parasites can thrive very close to you and your loved ones, right inside your yard. And considering the growing rate of Lyme disease, infecting nearly half a million people every year in the United States alone, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, you must stay on your guard against tick bites all the time. Getting rid of groundcovers like pachysandras and English ivy, which are havens for ticks, and growing other tick-repelling varieties in their place is one sure-shot way to do this.

Ticks like hanging out in shady and moist regions, and certain ground covers, such as pachysandra (Pachysandra terminalis), periwinkle (Vinca minor), and Japanese barberry (Berberis thunbergii), become excellent habitats for them. Pachysandras, in particular, although quite effective as a ground cover, are perfect resting spots for ticks in between their host visits. Mice, being one of the ticks' most prominent hosts, can often be seen scurrying along this ground cover, which is just the right height for the rodent as well, for carrying on its activities unseen by predators. Ticks, which happily piggyback on the mice, jump off their hosts after they are done with their blood meal, and the pachysandra offers them a moist, cool place to stay (say, as compared to a hot, dry, mowed lawn grass) until they find their next host. This is also why you must always know the types of pachysandra ground covers you should (and shouldn't) plant.

Japanese barberry shrubs, some of whose cultivars are often used as ground covers, are also great habitats for (blacklegged) deer ticks. Their impenetrable stands provide great shelter for mice, and the ticks love the high-humidity environment of their thickets. English ivy (Hedera helix) provides white-footed mice a perfect place to hide, a whopping majority of which carry Lyme's disease and transmit it to a feeding tick. Ferns are yet another tick-attracting ground cover plant that you'll probably want to avoid growing in your yard.

Although ground covers can often be a storehouse of ticks, all hope is not lost when it comes to covering your beautiful gardens with naturally fragrant carpet plants. There are several crops to your rescue that do an excellent job as ground covers while repelling ticks, mosquitoes, and other pests. Wormwood (Hedera helix), a plant that thrives in USDA Hardiness Zones 4 through 9, is one such option. According to a study conducted by Fitoterapia, a toluene extract from one of the species of wormwood (Artemisia abrotanum) showed repellent properties against both ticks and yellow fever-inducing mosquitoes. Plant it in well-drained soil that gets plenty of sun, and this ground cover is bound to give the pathogen-carrying arachnids a hard time.

Creeping thyme (Thymus serpyllum) is another solid option as a tick-repellant ground cover, which is also completely friendly for your pets. Creeping thyme is hardy in USDA Hardiness Zones 4 through 9. Plant them in a sunny spot and water occasionally during dry summers. Picking the wrong location and the wrong time are some of the common mistakes to avoid when using fragrant creeping thyme as a ground cover. Having said that, the catch with this species is that they don't typically perform well in high-traffic locations; for instance, if you have a lot of foot soldiers stomping your backyard (say, kids or pets). Catmint (Nepeta), santolina (Santolina chamaecyparissus), and lavender ( Lavandula angustifolia) are some of the other ground cover options to consider that have shown consistent tick-repellent behavior.