Hill help

gbd · Feb 15, 2001

GrantMO,

I've seen some nice terraced hills, I have considered this but its just not in the budget right now, to many other things going on. Really hadn't considered replacing the grass this soon but not much choice, can't have the house sliding down the hill in a few years.

Gerald

gbd · Feb 15, 2001

Blackcloud,

If it can survive on this hill, with the Florida sun(noon till dark)and keep it from washing away I'll live with the but.......this hill has been a problem ever since we built the house. Probably be nice to worry about the plants taking over instead of the house sliding down the hill./w3tcompact/icons/laugh.gif

cowboydoc · Feb 16, 2001

Gerald,
The best thing to do would be to terrace it. That's the only way you're really going to be able to stop it. You could do some very nice looking landscape with terracing. Depending on your budget I would use the landscape stones and it would look beautiful and you wouldn't have any erosion at all. I have seen guys try all types of vegetation with that kind of a hill and the only thing I've seen work is terracing.

gbd · Feb 16, 2001

Since its been mentioned a few times anyone know a good site or book on terracing, if I decide to go that way I'd like to do it right so its the only time I have to do it. Like I said I've seen some nice terraced hills, but have no idea where to start.

Thanks
Gerald

GrantMO · Feb 16, 2001

Gerald,
I don't know of any books on the subject but I'm sure there are some good ones as well as websites on the subject. Another alternative, and I realize possibly expensive, might be to talk to a landscape designer/architect. We had a landscape designer draw up a plan for our house landscaping like trees, shrubs and flowers etc. when we moved in and it was really pretty reasonable. We went with a third of what she thought up and did most of the plantings ourselves. I was very reluctant to let someone else give us that kind of advice but it worked out great. On the other hand you may be able to design and build a fine terrace system with the help of a book or good website. If you find one, please let me know to as I have a couple areas that could stand some terracing.

Henry · Feb 16, 2001

No problem, we do seem to have a few H's on the board.

Crown Vetch will hold any hill side together. I believe that it was developed by the Pennsynvania highway department to be used for hillside erosion control. It's a nice looking ground cover .....

But as the other guys are telling you, what out how it spreads. However, I have seen several suburbabn folks use it on hill sides and seem to be able to control it..... you just need to keep an eye on it.

Henry

poorboy · Feb 17, 2001

For what its worth we used to use vetch as a winter cover crop on our tobacco fields. It was a little bit of a problem to plow in the spring but not too bad, just an entanglement. Here in the hills the road dept. uses vetch and pines to hold the hill in the cut-thru's. I'm not sure if the pines and sycamores are on purpose but they sure seem to hold. The poor quality of the soil must keep the pines from getting to tall to uproot, I guess. Good luck with the vetch that's what I would try.

gbd · Feb 17, 2001

Just to let everyone know right now I'm going to go with the crown vetch. I'm still looking into terracing for a future project, have seen lots of pictures but not much info on actually doing it.

Grant if I come across anything I'll pass it along to you and everyone else.

Gerald