Hi, I am new here and I am so happy that I found you!

First, my best wishes go out to Newt for a speedy and complete recovery.

We live in the northern California foothills (Penn Valley) and we just bought 8 lovely acres. The problem is that we also have dogs and there are TONS of foxtails on this property!

What we would like to do is to get rid of the foxtails (yeah, right) and THEN our next problem is, what to grow? We need something that fills in quickly, something that won't poison our dogs, and something that can take foot traffic. Am I asking for a magic plant?

I know that we can use roundup on the foxtails, but is that the only way? Mowing them only makes them come back shorter. Plowing them under just plants the seeds for next season. I really hate these wicked weeds, my poor dogs have had so many horrible injuries due to foxtails...

We have considered simply planting clover, once we can get ahead of the foxtails, but I am open to any and all ideas!

We also would like some thick, fast growing plants to put along our fence line so that the dogs can't see the neighbors (they like to bark at the neighbor dogs but if they can't see them they are quiet.)

Our climate is pretty mild, some very hot summer days but not too many and some below freezing winters but not many. We rarely get snow. We mostly have rains through winter but it is dry in summers. We can water, but prefer not to water the entire 8 acres, if we can avoid it.

Sorry this is so long. I'll close now, thanking you in advance!