Wind and water erosion are the only problems that come to mind.

Have you seen this interesting link? Having spent much of my adult life in the Lowcountry of SC, I am extremely fond of the swept yard. I have no personal experience to share with you, however.

Here is a link that might be useful: Follow me.....

Thanks for the wonderful link! I'll have to check out that book.

Yes, I'm concerned about the erosion. We have really strong summer downpours here. We've been having record droughts since I started sweeping, so I don't know what's going to happen. For the most part water seems to run straight through this sand. However when it's really dry water sometimes beads and runs off of it. I'm just going to keep an eye on it.

And Wind does affect the swept area. We've been having really strong winds. Although there's never been a "sand storm" or anything, the wind does smooth out the surface of the sand, the same way it does a sand dune.

I'm definitely going to keep my eye on it. I'm hoping that the spreading roots of the citrus and especially the cabbage palms will stabilize the sand.

Bill

The photos have been deleted from my web site that showed swept yards from the 1930-1940s. The yard had a cypress fence around it with a wide board at the bottome that kept the sand from washing away. A perimeter barrier of some kind -- fence, stones, liriope, narrow flower borders -- helps keep your surface stable. Otherwise, everything loose erodes when it rains.

You might look around for a bamboo rake. Not necessarily better but somewhat more authentic?

Nell

The swept yards I remember were swept with a straw broom. I think that's a lot of what gave them the smooth stone look. However, they weren't sand, so don't know if that would work for you. How neat that you're reviving the tradition.

I don't know what type of sandy soil that you have, but in my area, walking on it makes the soil particles even smaller and more easily blown about. It's going to get tracked into your house. Very hard on the floors. It used to be that the yards were swept because people let the chicken run around the grounds. This kept the area clear of droppings. Also, kept down the weeds and "cleaned" the grounds just like the housewife cleaned her floors.

You might want to try some preemergent herbicide to keep weeds from seeding into the area. I'd be a little concerned, though, about lack of organic matter in the soil for your dwarf fruit trees.

I remember lots of swept yards in the country around my mother's home town in south Alabama. They were on hard-packed red clay, so they did get almost like stone on the surface, though they also tended to be muddy in wet weather. Many had stone walkways leading to the door to avoid tracking dirt or mud into the house. Brooms of straw or small twigs were used to clean them.

Maybe I'm not old enough to have seen them when they were still in wide spread use, but all of the swept yards I've ever seen were pretty small in size. Really just door yards large enough that if the brush/grass caught fire the house would not be endangered.

Swept yards are kinda hot in the summer since the heat reflects off the ground more and there isn't the cooling effect of the grass evaporating water.

The power lawn mower is really what put an end to the swept yard. They could easily handle the sorts of grass and weeds that the old non-powered style of mowers had trouble with.

Dust in the air and dirt in the house are also going to be problems with a bare dirt yard.

.....Alan.