Hey everyone. So I live in an area that is mostly clay underneath the ground. To keep my foundation from shifting when it contracts during the dry months, I have to water it regularly. I have a soaker hose that runs around the house, placed 1 foot away from the foundation.
This creates a problem with mowing where I can't just let my robot mower (or my push mower) run freely because of the risk of the soaker hose getting caught up in the blades, which has already happened once when I accidentally mowed too close.
To resolve this, I want to kill the grass (using landscaping fabric) in the 1 foot space between the foundation and hose and replace it with something else so I don't need to bother manually trimming it. At the same time, I don't want to use organic stuff like mulch because underground termites also exist in my area and I don't want it to attract them close to the foundation.
A brief search pointed me to using gravel. However, the problem with stones (especially larger ones) is that they also trap moisture underneath them, and the dark and damp areas can also maybe attract termites. Reading a bit more, I think a good compromise would be smaller and uneven gravel/rocks, as more space between them means sunlight penetrates more and moisture gets dried up quickly. Is this a good solution?
I don't wanna be rude, but you're wasting a shit ton of water, in an already arid area, and then you wanna create a hellscape out of it on top? My environmentalist heart hurts hearing this plan ๐
Look around what grows natively in your area.
A lawn is already wasteful and hard to keep alive in mild climates, in a desert this is just stupid.
Maybe there are some pollinator plants that tolerate this dryness. Hell, even cacti and succulents bloom and attract colibris and shit.
Sadly, I don't live in your climate and therefore can't give you many instructions out of experience.
Good look rewilding your space! ๐ค
Soils like this aren't mainly a problem in arid areas, they are a problem in areas with alternating dry/wet seasons. They likely live in an area that gets a decent amount of rainfall most of the year, but the hot summer causes the clay to dry out and shrink, which over time causes subsidence.
Alright, thanks. Learned something new!
Believe me, I hate a manicured lawn as much as you do. I already don't irrigate the grass at all, and just water the tree and plants on my front yard. For the foundation, I only turn on the soaker hose for 30 minutes once a week. That's still way less water compared to using my irrigation system to water the lawn weekly. I think using water for 30 minutes via soaker hose once a week is an acceptable compromise for avoiding the cost of foundation repairs and cracking walls in a couple of years or so.