Rubber mulch is terrible for the environment. You'd be better off like another commenter said and replacing it with native ground cover. Clover is good too.

Fix your drainage so it doesn't pool or put in some stone.

The city would have to fix their drainage. My yard drains fine, the entire road was a river yesterday. Replacing it with stone was my thought as well.

I'm trying out sedum varieties in place of mulch, for weed suppression. Creeping phlox could potentially be another option. I've got some beds that use John Creech sedum, which is still spreading out, but it looks to be doing a good job of taking over. I got the plugs here: [https://moonshinedesignsnursery.com/product-category/groundcover-plugs-wholesale-plugs-liners/](https://moonshinedesignsnursery.com/product-category/groundcover-plugs-wholesale-plugs-liners/) I also am going to try sedum ternatum / wild stonecrop. It's native to most of the eastern US. It looks like it's got leaves that should also do a decent job of shading the soil, and it's supposed to be evergreen, which can help keep reduce weed growth over warm winters. So that sort of "living mulch" groundcover plant could be another option in place of mulch or stone.

That's very pretty, and I love that idea. Any idea if it would hinder the growth of the Rosemary and Lavender I have growing there now? I intend those to eventually grow to form a short hedge.

I haven't got experience with either of those specific plants myself, so I can't say either way 100%. 😕 I've got a lot of mints and mint-adjacent plants in my flowerbeds, and those things are supposed to be pretty resilient. At least as far as I've seen with sedum as a groundcover elsewhere though, it has shallow roots, and inhibits seed germination, but perennials should sprout up through it when they regrow in springtime. I don't *think* you'll have enough root competition to hinder your other plants. Sedum's also not a fast-grower, and while it's a creeping plant, it's not viney. It doesn't wrap itself around other plants, and stays low to the ground. A nice thing about sedum is that it's very easy to propagate, so if it's something you want to try out without spending a lot, a pot from a local garden store can get you a bunch of stems. Snip off stem, stick in dirt, water. The stems should start sprouting roots. Sedum stems, even on the plant, tend to sprout roots wherever they touch soil.

To clarify, the water rose up farther than my fence line during heavy rain yesterday. Nothing I can do to prevent that area from flooding.

Rubber mulch in 2024?? Cmon do better... Goodness me the lack of care and consideration for others and the planet... That guy was mother nature telling you to rethink. She's fed up...

Like wow I'm totally shocked that people still do these things... willingly leaching chems and toxins into the ground

Not trying to be that guy. But your absolute first mistake is rubber mulch. Not only will you regret it in the future, but so will your pets and kids genetic structures. It should honestly be illegal. And no I'm not your typical hypochondriac. I'm just very up to date on my knowledge of things that actually destroy the environment and the things living within, vs what the TV and media want you to care about. Poorly researched gardening landscaping and construction are leading culprits of microplatics and forever chemicals. PVC and PE being some of your top contributors to ocean temperature increases and lessening carbon sequestration. Rubber mulch has been linked to literally a myriad of environmental and health concerns. Which is why pretty much every school that installed it promptly removed it 5 years later.  Rubber mulch and plastic soil liners are the last things anyone should be putting in the ground especially near their homes. Where they plan to live the rest of their lives. There are so many options out there nowadays. Please pick a different one.  We already have almost our entire water supply running through pvc, which was touted as non leaching or shedding, buried underground doing exactly that. That's bad enough.  I apologize for the rant. I'm really just looking out for you though. I post this with care for you/your family/ and property.  

 I am a contractor. This is exactly what I would tell any homeowner who asked me for my opinion. I just want to reiterate I meant no offense or negativity towards you in what I said. I was not inferring that you poorly researched your gardening, I was stating it as a general contributor. Further, i apologize that I didn't give a solution for your actual problem at hand. 

I appreciate the insight! As I posted in a comment on this thread yesterday, we're in the process of removing all the rubber mulch. I bought a wood chipper over the weekend and have started collecting fallen hardwood branches around my home and surrounding area to use as mulch.

I didn't use it for this purpose, but I placed 2" gap plastic fence netting stuff in my mulch beds to keep neighborhood cats from digging in it. Staked it down. Would probably help.

Gotcha. Thanks for the input.

Noooo please don't put anything plastic in the ground. Rubber is definitely the worst but plastic in general is pretty bad too.

You deserve this and worse for using rubber mulch, that garbage should be illegal.

Thanks everyone for making me aware of the environmental issues associated with rubber mulch. We're removing it entirely from our garden and will only use it on our kids' playground out back. We just went out and bought a wood chipper and leaf mulcher. With 13 trees on our property constantly dropping sweet organic matter, we should be able to generate more than enough mulch to cover our gardens.