Gardening A to Z: I is for Ivy

My father always had dreams of an English cottage garden, which I assume includes ivy growing up the sides of the house. While I agree it can be stunning on old brick houses, for my house it just wouldn't work. Ivy actually doesn't work anywhere at my house. I have no large area that seeks groundcover like ivy.

My personal growing of ivy always was as a houseplant. My previous home was great for growing houseplants. The ivy hung nicely in the window on a hook. It would get big and trail nicely. I did better with the more variegated leaf, though.

Photo by go_gooo on SXC

I remember doing a gardening job for someone. He had a small bed between his house and his neighbor's driveway that was a tangled mess of ivy, poison ivy, random weeds and a rosebush. He wanted it cleaned out, so as to not offend his neighbors anymore. Someone had once told me that I could cut ivy and it would grow back again.

I still go to his neighbor's house on occasion. I'm sad that the ivy didn't really grow back after all of these years. But none of the other junk that is in there grew back. I think I will leave groundcovers to other people.