For the past six years, I have been experimenting with different plants and grasses to see what will actually grow on my high desert homestead without constant watering.
I have tried sorghum, amaranth, wheat, rye, barley, arugula, alfalfa, clover, Bermuda grass, blue grama, and plenty of other things along the way.
Some did surprisingly well. Some barely survived. A few continue to reseed themselves and show up in new places every year.
But after six years of experimenting, I think I finally have a clear winner.
Blue grama grass.
Explore the off-grid library hub. Videos are organized under the five core pillars, with diagrams, photo overviews, and interviews gathered here.
Videos in the Library are now located on their corresponding pillar pages near the bottom of each page. More broad topics are here:
Six Years of Trying to Establish Ground Cover
When I first moved onto this property, there was very little useful ground cover. There were native plants and weeds scattered around, but there was also a lot of exposed high desert dirt.
I do not have a well, and I have never had enough water available to simply irrigate acres of grass. If I was going to establish meaningful ground cover, I needed plants that could eventually survive primarily on the precipitation that naturally falls here.
That has turned into a long experiment.
I Tried Just About Everything
Sorghum did pretty well. Amaranth did okay. Wheat, rye, and barley have all surprised me by occasionally popping up around the homestead without much attention.
Arugula has probably been one of the biggest surprises. I planted it years ago, and it continues to grow, produce seed, and plant itself again. I find new arugula growing in places where I never intentionally planted it.
Alfalfa has also done well. It has been slower to spread, but the individual plants that become established seem to stick around and produce more seed.
Clover has not done nearly as well for me. That does not mean clover cannot work in the high desert. It simply has not performed particularly well under the conditions on my property.
Bermuda Grass Started to Work
Bermuda grass was one of the first grasses that really started giving me the kind of ground cover I was looking for.
I spread quite a bit of Bermuda seed around the homestead, and eventually I started seeing patches establish themselves. That was encouraging because I wanted something capable of filling bare spaces rather than requiring me to continually replant the same ground.
For a while, Bermuda looked like it might be the answer.
Then the monsoon arrived and something else happened.
Blue Grama Suddenly Took Off
After a good monsoon rain, blue grama started appearing everywhere.
What makes this particularly impressive to me is how little blue grama seed I originally planted.
I put down many pounds of Bermuda grass seed, but only about one pound of blue grama seed.
Today I can find far more thriving blue grama throughout the homestead than I would have expected from that small amount of seed.
It is growing in the field where I have spent years improving the soil, but that is not the part that surprised me the most.
I am also finding it growing in areas where I did very little to improve the soil.
That is what really got my attention.
It Is Growing Without Irrigation
I have not been watering these areas to keep the blue grama alive.
It is growing from rainfall.
That is one of the most important requirements I have for a long-term cover crop on this property.
I can use harvested rainwater to help gardens, trees, and other important plants when necessary, but I cannot reasonably irrigate the entire homestead and pasture. Ground cover needs to become increasingly self-sufficient once it is established.
Blue grama appears to be particularly well suited to doing exactly that here.
Sometimes I Want a Plant to Take Over
Over the years, people have warned me about several plants I have introduced.
I have been told that goji berries will take over. I have been warned that mint will spread everywhere. I have been told that Bermuda grass will become impossible to control.
My experience has been very different.
In this environment, getting plants to establish themselves and spread is usually the difficult part.
If a useful grass can survive the dry conditions, reproduce, and gradually cover exposed soil without me constantly watering and replanting it, that is not necessarily a problem for me. In many areas of this property, that is exactly what I want.
Blue Grama and Bermuda May Work Together
I do not expect blue grama to be the only grass growing here.
The Bermuda grass is established in several areas and continues to spread. Blue grama is filling other spaces. Alfalfa and arugula continue showing up, and native plants grow throughout the property as well.
Over time, I expect these plants to find the areas where each one is best suited.
Bermuda may dominate some patches. Blue grama may dominate others. Alfalfa, arugula, native grasses, and other plants can continue filling spaces between them.
I am much more interested in having healthy, covered soil than creating a perfectly uniform field of one species.
Why Ground Cover Matters Here
Bare dirt does not do much for me.
Vegetation helps protect the soil surface, slows erosion, adds organic material, provides roots below the surface, catches moisture, and eventually creates more material that can return to the soil.
It can also eventually provide additional forage on a property where I keep animals.
That is why I have spent so much time experimenting with plants that can survive here without turning the property into an irrigated lawn.
If I Could Start Over
If I could go back six years knowing what I know today, blue grama would probably be one of the first grasses I planted.
That does not mean it is the perfect grass for every property or every high desert environment. I can only speak to what I have observed on my own land.
But I have planted a lot of different things under the same difficult conditions, and blue grama has continued to stand out.
I planted very little of it compared with some of the other grasses. It is now growing throughout the homestead. It is surviving without irrigation. I am finding it in improved and unimproved soil, and it appears capable of becoming a meaningful part of the permanent ground cover here.
After six years of experimenting, that is enough for me to call it.
Blue grama wins.
```