Growing plants between driveway paving stones?

[SmittenGarden]

Not sure if this is the right place to post this but I couldn't think of anywhere else to ask.

When we bought our house two and half years ago, (from a flipper who wasn't very good at doing up houses) the drive way in our back garden (back half of it is half drive way area I front of the automatic hate and the rest solid concrete foundation under a four post wooden car port) was set up in at the time I felt a rather attractive crazy paving with gravel....by that I mean its irregular shaped stone slabs set apart from each other with large gaps. In which they filled which loose gravel. You pulling in through the gate (which makes up half of our back wall) onto this crazy paving gravel and do a sharp turn into the carport which sits on its own solid concrete foundation. This "crazy paving" which when we bought it seemed attractive at the time is another testament to the flipper ineptitude at what he does and greed... All about spend little to no money investing, not knowing what he is doing and wanting big bucks back. I won't bore you with details of the stupid stuff that we keep finding...but I'll just say as far the paving is concerned I do t think he did it properly and we are loosing stone slabs (which are not huge (not much bigger than my size 5 feet) from driving over them constantly. I think they have been just placed over gravel and then gravel between the gaps....

One of my father in laws neighbors has a rather boho tiny front garden which has tiny set apart pavers like ours (but dif shape) but instead of gravel they have I think Mose growing all over and I between. I'm wondering if that would be a god option for us.. to plant some Mose or something over or instead of the gravel to keep the slabs in place.

Except I don't know where to start or what I should know before doing this....
Such as can I plant over the gravel so as not to loose the hight in the driveway as the slabs are sitting on gravel. Or if it can be kept to just the driveway and maybe our foot path and not take over our grass and flower beds? Also not sure how great planted driveways are? R are they a bad idea?

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by SmittenGarden

Not sure if this is the right place to post this but I couldn't think of anywhere else to ask.

When we bought our house two and half years ago, (from a flipper who wasn't very good at doing up houses) the drive way in our back garden (back half of it is half drive way area I front of the automatic hate and the rest solid concrete foundation under a four post wooden car port) was set up in at the time I felt a rather attractive crazy paving with gravel....by that I mean its irregular shaped stone slabs set apart from each other with large gaps. In which they filled which loose gravel. You pulling in through the gate (which makes up half of our back wall) onto this crazy paving gravel and do a sharp turn into the carport which sits on its own solid concrete foundation. This "crazy paving" which when we bought it seemed attractive at the time is another testament to the flipper ineptitude at what he does and greed... All about spend little to no money investing, not knowing what he is doing and wanting big bucks back. I won't bore you with details of the stupid stuff that we keep finding...but I'll just say as far the paving is concerned I do t think he did it properly and we are loosing stone slabs (which are not huge (not much bigger than my size 5 feet) from driving over them constantly. I think they have been just placed over gravel and then gravel between the gaps....

One of my father in laws neighbors has a rather boho tiny front garden which has tiny set apart pavers like ours (but dif shape) but instead of gravel they have I think Mose growing all over and I between. I'm wondering if that would be a god option for us.. to plant some Mose or something over or instead of the gravel to keep the slabs in place.

Except I don't know where to start or what I should know before doing this....
Such as can I plant over the gravel so as not to loose the hight in the driveway as the slabs are sitting on gravel. Or if it can be kept to just the driveway and maybe our foot path and not take over our grass and flower beds? Also not sure how great planted driveways are? R are they a bad idea?

By the sounds of it, I would try containers.

Not the same conditions as you have, but a beautiful example of what one
can grow in the middle of a driveway with a ribbon of concrete on each side for
the tires to drive on - http://www.srgc.org.uk/logs/logdir/2...B_LOG_1714.pdf

[Father'sDaughter]

Originally Posted by SmittenGarden

and we are loosing stone slabs (which are not huge (not much bigger than my size 5 feet) from driving over them constantly. I think they have been just placed over gravel and then gravel between the gaps....



One of my father in laws neighbors has a rather boho tiny front garden which has tiny set apart pavers like ours (but dif shape) but instead of gravel they have I think Mose growing all over and I between. I'm wondering if that would be a god option for us.. to plant some Mose or something over or instead of the gravel to keep the slabs in place.



Except I don't know where to start or what I should know before doing this....

Such as can I plant over the gravel so as not to loose the hight in the driveway as the slabs are sitting on gravel. Or if it can be kept to just the driveway and maybe our foot path and not take over our grass and flower beds? Also not sure how great planted driveways are? R are they a bad idea?

If I were in your shoes, I would take up all the pavers and just live with a gravel driveway for the time being. If the flipper didn't prepare a proper bed for the pavers, no amount of plantings in between them will ever stabilize them. And if you don't need the pavers to build a walkway, small patio or paths elsewhere on the property, you can always try selling them on craigslist.

[habitat_gardener]

Originally Posted by Father'sDaughter

If I were in your shoes, I would take up all the pavers and just live with a gravel driveway for the time being. If the flipper didn't prepare a proper bed for the pavers, no amount of plantings in between them will ever stabilize them. And if you don't need the pavers to build a walkway, small patio or paths elsewhere on the property, you can always try selling them on craigslist.

Yes, that, or else remove the pavers and gravel, get a truckload of sand, spread it, carefully wet it down as you set each paver in place, sweep sand away from the cracks between pavers, and maybe add gravel between pavers if there's room. Something like that. Of course, if he set pavers on top of gravel, he probably didn't tamp the soil either, so it'd be better to build a proper foundation first.

Yeah, just take the pavers out.

[SmittenGarden]

Originally Posted by Father'sDaughter

If I were in your shoes, I would take up all the pavers and just live with a gravel driveway for the time being. If the flipper didn't prepare a proper bed for the pavers, no amount of plantings in between them will ever stabilize them. And if you don't need the pavers to build a walkway, small patio or paths elsewhere on the property, you can always try selling them on craigslist.

Well it's an assumption of mine that he didn't as the ones that came up just left puddles of gravel...that said we let grass and clover encroach onto parts of the stones and gravel and those few slabs now seem pretty stable.

We couldn't live with just the gravel....

[SmittenGarden]

Originally Posted by habitat_gardener

Yes, that, or else remove the pavers and gravel, get a truckload of sand, spread it, carefully wet it down as you set each paver in place, sweep sand away from the cracks between pavers, and maybe add gravel between pavers if there's room. Something like that. Of course, if he set pavers on top of gravel, he probably didn't tamp the soil either, so it'd be better to build a proper foundation first.

Yeah, just take the pavers out.

It might be worth doing that....even if we did it bit by bit over several weekends.

[clkeiper]

You can always rent a gas powered tamper from an equipment rental store and try tamping it first. That might settle all the pavers and loose understone to a tighted fit then add a little more sand or pea gravel to finish it if you need to.

Moss? in the pavers? if you are driving on it, no. If you are walking on it, yes. stick to clover if you are driving on it.