Imagine your front yard entirely filled with blooming color for most of the year. This golden Lantana (Lantana montevidensis) could be your answer for a drought-tolerant, easy care lawn substitute.  Even better--you can throw your lawn mower away!

Replacing your lawn with ground covers

One beautiful replacement for your lawn is low-growing Lantana (Lantana montevidensis L. selowiana). It grows very fast and blooms almost year 'round. Your local nursery should have young plants in a rainbow of floral colors so you can pick one--or more--to complement the color of your home. For example, a home painted a white or sand color might look great with a front yard densely filled with brilliant yellow blooms. For a home with a pink exterior, consider purple, white or sizzling orange Lantana. There is even a newish variety, called 'Lemon Swirl' with variegated yellow-green leaves and bright yellow flowers. Lantana is very drought tolerant; too much water and fertilizer will result in fewer flowers.

Plant a mix of colors of low-growing Lantana montevidensis to create a front yard that looks like this for months on end. Be careful that you do NOT install Lantana camara, a shrub that grows to 6 feet tall.

Another xeriscape ground covering shrub is the Acacia redolens, especially the 'Desert Carpet' variety. This plant has narrow gray-green leaves, grows to about 2 feet in height and in early spring puts on a dazzling show with puffy yellow ball-shaped flower. An important virtue of this shrub is that a single plant can spread as wide as 15 feet. And talk about drought tolerant--Acacia redolens needs little water beyond what rain falls from the sky.

Another plant to consider is Creeping Rosemary (Rosemarinus officinalis), a classic in Mediterranean gardens. This photo also shows gray-green Dymondia which forms a dense, flat ground covering mat.  The owners have included an aloe shooting up red blooms, some purple statice (sea lavender) and other low growing plants.  For more about replacements in a parking median, go here.

Fast growing Rosemary is beloved by cooks and bees alike. The creeping variety will grow to about 1 foot in height with dark green, fragrant narrow leaves. In early spring bees swarm to its pale purple flowers. Rosemary needs little watering, only light fertilizer and good drainage. (A word of caution: many bees in California, Nevada, Arizona and Texas have been Africanized and may be dangerous in a swarm.)

No doubt your local nursery will have other suggestions of good ground cover shrubs for your area and how to care for them. Be sure to tell them you want a "low-growing drought tolerant ground cover." 

Replacing your lawn -- read this for what NOT to do

Replacing your lawn with perennials

Replacing your lawn with ornamental grasses

Replacing your lawn with pavers

Replacing your lawn with mazes and knot gardens

Replacing the lawn in your parking median