Thorny problems: can I introduce daisies to my lawn?

Moss-killing products based on natural fatty acids (Bayer Moss Killer) or pelargonic acid (Scotts Weedol Max) should be used with care around green, non-woody garden plants as they can damage them. The best course of action where moss is blanketing borders is to scrape away as much as possible from around plants and lightly cultivate the soil between them with a hoe or handfork. Adding organic matter to the soil to improve drainage is helpful. Mushroom compost (which is slightly alkaline) would be useful for this, though obviously not in great quantities around acid-loving woodland plants.

Daisy, daisy

Q: I would rather like daisies to grow in my garden as I find them pretty and also, I understand, they are attractive to bees. How do I go about introducing daisies into my lawn or do you think this would be inadvisable in case they might overwhelm the grass?

Alison Hood, via email

A: By all means grow daisies on your lawn if that is what you would like to do perhaps the easiest way to do so would be to swap a piece of your turf for a daisy-strewn square belonging to a lawn-proud neighbour, before he/she (probably he) knobbles them with a weedkiller. From this imported patch they would be sure to spread quickly.

People who like immaculate green lawns wage war on anything that flowers, but one of the great things about gardening is that you can do what you like out there as long as what you do (or plant) doesnt demolish local property values. A little rash of daisies on a lawn is not exactly going to do that, is it?

However, one of the downsides of encouraging daisy proliferation is the fact that, since they seem to flower randomly more or less all summer, you will not really be able to mow the grass at all without decapitating them each time you do so, which I suspect you would hate doing.

Have you considered filling your garden with all sorts of other such lovely composite flowers with universally bright petals that attract all sorts of pollinating insects? Since you clearly like tiddlers, how about starting with the beautifully messy little wall-and-paving-invading Spanish daisy (Erigeron karvinskianus).

You could let your daisy-quest become a bit of a thing. In pots, beds and borders you could assemble an endless daisy parade, consisting of both annuals and perennials, that would light up the garden from early spring, starting with the earliest, Doronicum orientale (leopards bane), ending in late autumn with Inula hookeri, and on the way taking in all sorts of summer-flowering plants in the general daisy (Asteraceae/Compositae) plant families.

Look for plants with names such as aster, of course, and bellis, leucanthemum, helianthus and helianthemum, rudbeckia, and argyranthemum to name but a few.

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Thorny problems: can I introduce daisies to my lawn?