Pea gravel or wood chips or something else?
May 13, 2017 4:54 PM   Subscribe

We are adding on to our house and it will take up half of our small backyard so we are thinking of turning the rest of it more into a large patio/courtyard type place. But I'm trying to decide what is a cost effective patio "surface" and was considering pea gravel but worried about committing to it. Any experience with pea gravel or bark chips?

I was initially sold on the idea of pea gravel because we could get a bunch delivered and then have a surface which hopefully keeps out weeds and could cover a lot of area without committing to a flagstone patio or more concrete (which we don't want). However, we will not have great access around the sides of the home once we put in the addition (or even now). It would all need to be delivered and carted around by the wheelbarrow-load no matter what. During construction we will have slightly better access through an open fence but eventually we have to close that fence up and then it's a long path around the side of the house.

One thought I had was bark chips. It's cheaper and a little lighter to cart plus less of a commitment and, of course, if we wanted more greenery it can just get dug under. We will also be taking down a large cherry which is dying and could have them leave the chips on site.

Here's how we want to use the space–

- Kid play zone! I know this is sort of antithetical to the whole courtyard concept and I'm still thinking of ways to make an area of ground great for kid lounging. Both pea gravel and bark chips seem kind of equally horrible. Though maybe bark chips better for laying a picnic blanket down on? But splintery? Neither are great for bare feet.

- Hanging out in chairs, having people over for drinks/meals, etc.. This is where having a total hardscape would be best but I just don't want it. I want to be able to plant here and there and will be putting in flagstones here and there as we need them but I want rainwater to get through, etc. How do you think tables/chairs fare on different surfaces? Oh, and we don't want to do a deck because being raised up makes our yard less private and the neighbors are close.

Help me decide which surface is better or if there is another option we should consider? Any reason the chips from our tree are a bad idea?
posted by amanda to Home & Garden (19 answers total) 3 users marked this as a favorite
 
I would buy bales of straw and live with that as a mulch for the summer. It's easy and cheap and not a pain to lay out.

Gravel gets iffy because without landscaping fabric weeds grow through it, and it's not necessarily nice on your feet or when you want to scrape a chair from one place to another.

Your tree chips are fine too -- it's freaking brutal to haul three cubic yards of wood mulch up hills--but your area may be less of a resource suck. If you lay cardboard beneath them, like Amazon boxes, you can buy a little time before the weeds spring up.

Hedging your bets for one summer will let you evaluate and see where you really want to sit, what you really want to hide. Trees and hedges are planted regularly in late August, September or October, and I think you'd have more knowledge of your use patterns by then.

(I guess what I'm saying is, let the add on happen first and don't commit to something in addition to that until that part has had a chance to settle in your behavior patterns.)
posted by A Terrible Llama at 5:02 PM on May 13, 2017 [4 favorites]


Pea gravel is kind of terrible to walk on. It rolls unde your feet. People use it to deter people from walking on areas in a landscape. If you want to use the yard for anything but looking at I would vote against it.
posted by Kriesa at 5:05 PM on May 13, 2017 [9 favorites]


Bark chips are very splintery. Fine, painful splinters. Also, the bark decomposes over time. I have definitely seen pea gravel set with flagstones.
posted by gryphonlover at 5:12 PM on May 13, 2017 [1 favorite]


What about a portable deck?
Make treated 4"x4" frames with deck boards on top, put black plastic or landscape fabric underneath. Leave uncovered area in grass.
posted by H21 at 5:15 PM on May 13, 2017


Yeah, pea gravel is tough under foot and noisy too. We went with something called 3/8 minus crush "road base". There are many kinds of road base depending on where you live. Ours is a combination of crushed limestone clay and sand. You can rent a plate compactor to make it a hard surface, almost as hard as concrete if that's what you want. Or go with just tamping (we did). Make your own tamper!

It's water permeable and comfortable on bare feet. It's somewhat weed resistant as long as you but a barrier layer down first (weed cloth or plastic). Seeds can take root in the surface, so you have to catch that early.
posted by Zedcaster at 5:27 PM on May 13, 2017


One other point about pea gravel, if people walk on it, it will get tracked around to some degree. Not good on interior floor finishes.
I built a river rock (smooth stones about 1 1/2" to 2") walk with flagstone "steeping stones". No one walks on the river rock. Not even the cat.
I put down filter fabric first to keep the weeds down, but after a year or so there's enough dust/dirt at the bottom of the rock bed I have to weed it once in a while.
If you don't live in a high wind area they sell "foundation blocks" for surface built decks at the big box stores.
posted by rudd135 at 5:29 PM on May 13, 2017


Pea gravel and what-we-called "tan bark" were very common where I grew up and are shoes-required, especially since other pokey stuff can hide in them pretty well.

Have you seen what's happened in fake grass lately? My mom just got it and it's much better than any I've ever seen before.
posted by rhizome at 5:33 PM on May 13, 2017 [3 favorites]


How about a low walkable ground cover like oregano thyme or sage?
posted by bq at 5:35 PM on May 13, 2017 [3 favorites]


Getting rid of any type of small rock is a pain. I picked out what I could and added dirt on top of my empty rose beds years ago and I can still hear the shovel shreeee across the occasional shards of gravel when adding new plants. It does break up the red clay soil, but I still must keep the lawn mower at a higher setting, just in case.

So for an adaptable lawn I would go with cypress or cedar mulch, something insect-resistant and shredded. I'm cheap, so I lay out newspaper over the pathways first, then a couple of inches of mulch. Weeds eventually get through... I yank them up.

Either use patio furniture with horizontal bars at the bottom, or put in some pavers where the chair and table legs will go. We've made our own pavers with this mold, then added dirt and creeping jenny in the gaps between them (again, cheap and adaptable). A little concrete colorant in a couple of colors makes a nice change from boring gray. If we have a cement project and a little extra in the wheelbarrow... out comes the paver mold.
posted by TrishaU at 8:22 PM on May 13, 2017 [1 favorite]


We bricked over a pea gravel patio because I was tired of having pea gravel ALL OVER my floors inside. Part of the driveway is still pea gravel, and it is my nemesis. I loathe the stuff. There are three pieces of pea gravel on my kitchen floor right this second; it gets caught in shoes.
posted by purpleclover at 9:05 PM on May 13, 2017 [3 favorites]


We removed a shed from the corner of our yard and wanted to kind of just cheaply cover the area and make it useable without spending lots of money. We put down landscape fabric as a weed barrier and put about 12 inches of 3/4 inch bark chips on top. On one side is a raised bed and then we put a large table, a bench and chairs. So far it has worked fine. Not great for walking barefoot but considering what alternatives would have cost, we're very happy with it one year in. We put the bark chips in by wheelbarrow which was easy to do - you need some kind of barrier so they don't spread everywhere (we used old lumber and grading stakes).
Useability and lifespan greatly depend on the climate you're in. With lots of rain the bark chips disintegrate very fast and become top soil. We're in CA so tend do get long dry spells during the summer which makes bark an Ok choice - in a more moderate climate you'd have to re-mulch every year.
Btw our kids like the surface.
posted by The Toad at 9:41 PM on May 13, 2017 [1 favorite]


We have a small yard and two very active kids and spent years trying to figure out what to put down. Nothing would grow due to lack of light and soil condition. We went in every direction from playground foam yard surface, to artificial grass, to wood chips to pulverized granite.

The winner was stones, but not pea gravel, we opted for small (1/4"} beach stones, smooth, easy on the foot and so far it was been great.

We almost did wood chips as we have wood chips on much of the property, but I was concerned about splinters and such. If we did use them, it would have only been "playground" chips, which have been tumbled and are much easier on the foot and really not that much more expensive. The beach pebbles are quite a bit more, but IMHO well worth it.

I have MUCH to say the subject, so if any of this hekp and you want more info, please ask here or mefi mail me

Henry
posted by silsurf at 10:26 PM on May 13, 2017 [1 favorite]


One thing about pea gravel; if the is too small it can actually become a magnet for cats to defecate in because essentially it's like a giant litter box. This happened to me and there is pretty much nothing you can do to stop it happening. So if you do go for it - don't have the small stones.
posted by TheGarden at 10:29 PM on May 13, 2017


If you go with chips, Chip Drop is really great in some regions for connecting arborists with people who need chips.
posted by aniola at 10:45 PM on May 13, 2017 [1 favorite]


Decomposed granite disintegrates slowly over time, which helps eliminate the pea gravel removal issue. If properly put in, it's a stable and weed-blocking material. Looks tidy, too.
posted by quince at 10:57 PM on May 13, 2017


If you go the bark route, make sure you get "play chips". Regular bark will splinter and track everywhere but these are made for playgrounds.
posted by matildaben at 8:46 AM on May 14, 2017 [1 favorite]


Rubber gravel?
posted by aramaic at 8:58 AM on May 14, 2017


What about rubber playground mulch?
posted by medusa at 9:16 AM on May 14, 2017 [1 favorite]


Rubber mulch is great but: it gets very hot and smells weird when it's in full sun on a hot day. Also, it doesn't turn into top soil (can be a plus or a minus depending on your long term plans).
posted by The Toad at 1:36 PM on May 14, 2017 [1 favorite]


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