What plants work well for you in your rock bed or gravel strip?
Rock gardening in roadside strip
The last bit of lawn to be dug out in our yard was the city boulevard, a roughly triangular bit that we refer to as "Palliser's Triangle". (Maybe one has to be familiar with Canadian history to get that reference... Anyway, it's turned out to be a great deal better for gardening than its namesake. )
While it was not intentionally designed as a rock garden, many of the plants out there would be applicable to one, and it's worth noting that they have all proven tolerant of road salt. We have kept the plantings low so as not to obscure visibility for cars turning the corner. (However, as the local traffic generally caroms around the corner on two wheels, with tires squealing, perhaps it would only add to the fun if our plantings made it a blind corner as well.)
Anyway, some of the plants:
Alchemilla erythropoda, mollis
Antennaria rosea
Artemesia stellariana 'Silver Brocade' (self-seeded)
Aubretia 'Royal Red'
Carex flacca
Festuca amethystina, glauca
Helicotrichon sempervirens
Hieracium villosum
Hymenoxys grandiflora
Juniperus horizontalis - can't remember which one; will get much too big eventually, and will have to be removed - would look very boring filled only with juniper.
Melica sp. (M. altissima atropurpurea?)
Monarda punctata
Lotus corniculatus plenus
Lupinus nootkatensis
Penstemon nitidus (self-seeded from other bed)
Picea pungens 'Thuem'
Polemonium pulcherrimum
Potentilla x tonguei
Potentilla 'Yellow Gem'
Rose 'Purple Pavement'
Saponaria ocymoides
various sempervivums
Silene uniflora compacta
Stachys monieri 'Hummelo'
Tanacetum parthenium plenum
Teucrium chamaedrys
Thymus praecox and a variety of other thymes
Verbascum 'Letitia'
Veronica spicata 'Blauteppich'
Veronica spicata ssp. incana
Various small spring bulbs
Pardon all the edits - I keep looking at the picture and seeing something I missed.
This message was edited Feb 23, 2008 10:43 PM
Well thank you so much for the long helpful hints. I will look into those. I am excited too. The picture is gorgeous. How long have you had these plants?
Thanks! I think the bed is in it's third year in that photo from last June, if that was the question. Some of the plants I've had for many years in other beds, some only for 2-3 years. Anyway, they all seem to be hardy here (in case, that was actually the question, LOL!)
If the rock bed or gravel strip is along black asphalt (tar), make sure you use more heat tolerant plants next to the tar. Sun on the black tar heats up the soil terribly.
Nice triangle, Alta. I grow Antennaria rosea var. confinus. Looks to be about half the size of your rosea, perhaps a bit less.
FYI, you can delete the extra "This message was edited . . . " when you edit.
Ah, good trick, Leftwood - now I look much smarter with only one edit, LOL!
How tall in cm or inches does your variety of pussytoes get?
You answered my question and then some altagardener.
For me, Antennaria rosea var. confinus flowerheads grow about 5in/13cm high. The white centered pussytoes surrounded by red/maroon is quite stunning with the silver foliage. I expect it is the same with the straight species.
Okay, here is a not so good picture, after being bombarded by rain a few days before. The Antennaria is at the bottom right. Disregard the dead stuff(please!), but other things in flower are Achillea ageratifolia(back center), Cerastium alpinum var. lanatum(back left). In bud: Scabiosa japonica nana(left front), Viola pedata(back right). A very un-baby's breath looking Gypsophila bungeana resides in the center.
Very nice, Leftwood! Yes, your pussytoes would be about half the height of my non-dwarfish species grown in regular soil.
By the way, I have one sprout up in a pot of Pulsatilla turczaninovii! I do hope you'll update us in spring with photos of your more mature plants?
Very pretty! Love that wedge of a garden, Altagardener.
P. turczaninovii !!!! That's wonderful! It'll be a while before I have any update pics, but from last year you can salivate over this: http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/fp.php?pid=3480667
I know there are different forms out there, as most pics on the web are similar, but not the same, especially as they open. Plus, not as blue.
thanks for your info and the picture leftwood! Lots of plants are suggested I have never heard of. So thanks a ton for all the ideas!
altagardener, what kind of maintenance does your garden have? Do you have to keep pulling seedlings etc.? Same for you Leftwood.
Well, that's an interesting question from a number of angles. The amount of maintenance for a yard full of perennial beds is a vast amount less than for the same yard filled with well-maintained lawn. But it's a great deal more maintenance than for a yard full of poorly-kept, crappy lawn. So, there's that. On the other hand, please don't make the assumption that such a thing as a "no maintenance" garden exists - it doesn't (...although a really crappy lawn might be the closest thing to it, in an urban setting, anyway).
I would never advise anyone who isn't very interested in gardening, and also deeply interested in plants, to suddenly get rid of all their lawn. (Note: We got rid of our lawn because it's boring, and useless in a gardening respect... not for the purpose of reducing maintenance, though it did that too.)
Anyone who is actually interested in gardening, by my reasoning, anyway, has long since made the decision that some weeding is simply a part of gardening - whether it's for removal of actual weeds, or for removal of excess self-seeded plants. (I don't mind weeding at all - I find it nice, mindless, repetitive activity, but I actually have to spend very little time at it.) Putting down an organic mulch (cedar and fir bark are good here) helps to reduce weeding... as long as the perennial weeds have been removed first. (There really aren't any shortcuts.)
As I'm frequently loitering out in the front yard, looking at the plants, sometimes doing a little maintenance, I get asked (or told) all the time by passersby that the "flowers" look so nice, "but isn't it a lot of work?" How to answer when they really just don't get it? I'm out there because I WANT to be - I ENJOY doing that stuff, whether it's a bit of weeding or transplanting or much more often, just looking at the plants. IT'S NOT WORK!
Anyway, sorry for the rant, (and sorry for going way off the topic of Rock and Alpine Gardening too) but I hope you understand what I'm getting at?
Yea, I understand. I enjoy sifting through my plants too. I don't consider what I do weeding, since that tends to sound negative and time consuming. I don't think weeding is mindless for me, because I get to see exciting things when I am down close. Like a flower that is poking through the ground that I didn't expect to survive. Or things that look like spore holes in my dirt. Good or bad, I enjoy it. I was just wondering because I like jasmine. I have read that you can't get ride of it once you plant it. I don't really want plants like that. If you stay on top of your weeding and get a good jump on the season, you...at least I don't have to spend hours a day pulling out what I don't want.
I don't think a no maintenance garden doesn't exist either. I think gardening is more than just planting veggies or plants of any kind, and then just leave them for you to enjoy. There is one weed ( I consider a weed) I don't enjoy trying to pull or get ride of. That is morning glory.
Jasmine. The common name for many different plants. But I wonder if the one you are thinking about would have that rampant quality in your zone 6? Aren't there ones that are just barely hardy there? Surely they would not be invasive . . . ? Of course, no jasmine is hardy where I live, so don't be taking my word on this.
About garden maintenance, Alta sums it up pretty well. My alpine gardening is in pots and troughs, with some of the more adaptable ones in a regular garden with soil bordering on alpine-like. I am a major player in the upkeep of the rock garden at our Minnesota Arboretum. As with any perennial garden that is mulched (this one with small stones), the need for weeding is less. We only have two major herbaceous pests: oxalis and annual bluegrass, with just a smattering of others, like the Sedum sexangulare ( a tiny sedum) the the Arboretum grows on purpose across the walkway. (How it wanders across the walk and to the top of our garden, I'll never know.) Our real problem is tree seeds: basswood and sugar maple. I'm sorry to say our rock garden is becoming more and more shade garden, as the Arb's aristocracy has a big thing about trees, and are unwilling to cut branches. At one time, in parts of the garden that maple's branches would sweep the mulch bare. And don't forget this is a rock mulch!
Oh my . . . . . how do I justify that ranting tangent? Got it . . .
Well Jane, it just goes to show ya. It's always something.
------------- Rosanne Rosannadanna
LOL
Well, I don't really know about how invasive the Jasmine would be here. I don't know if I want to chance it either since it doesn't have good reviews. I have tried to look for ones that are more hardy and less invasive. Would the less hardy ones be less likely to be invasive? I thought they would be since they are trying that much harder to survive. Do you get fined for pruning your trees then? Pretty strong trees!
As Leftwood said, "jasmine" is a common name for many things (as well as a genus name):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jasmine
If you can better define what your version of "jasmine" is, you should be able to find out if that plant is invasive or not in your area (or whether it's even hardy). Do you know its latin name? (That would be the most valuable piece of info for finding out its habits.) Failing that, perhaps there is a regional forum here that more or less applies to your area - if you ask on there, perhaps someone will be able to supply both a name (if it is commonly grown there), and answer the question about invasiveness. Or if you can describe it sufficiently, you might be able to find out more about it by posting on the Plant ID forum.
Oh, like I said, I have search to no avail. At least got no results I was hoping for. So I am not really concerned anymore and I don't plan on taking it any further.
Quoting:
At one time, in parts of the garden that maple's branches would sweep the mulch bare.
Guess I forgot to add a crucial notation at the end:
---- in a strong wind
And yes, these were not wimpy branches.
I don't know what would happen if we were ever caught pruning arboretum trees. (We can do whatever we want with anything on our own land.)
We did "find" a partial solution to the problem. We got the head gardener there interested in rock gardening. Ted's a really great guy. He even went with several of our club members to the once every 10 years International convention on alpine gardening in the U.K., 5-10 years ago. But even he is not allowed to cut as high as we would like. All I can say is: you know how some mountain trails might have signs that say "Watch for falling rocks"? Well the MN Arboretum should have signs that say "Watch for crossing branches". One day, they will have a big lawsuit to contend with, as some crossing branches are 4-6 inches in diameter and right at a 5.5-6 foot level. Perfect noggin knocking level.
My goodness, you are right! That is a funny thing to say, but at least people just might watch themselves closer before banging on the tree branches! Are there a lot of branch covered streets there? I think it is pretty but I can also see where there might be problems with that too.
Are there a lot of branch covered streets there?
Not at all. Like most other places (I think), the society here is sue happy-for victims and sue cautious-for businesses. The Arboretum seems to be bucking the system.
Oh, well that sounds like a happy place to live. I was wondering, because my favorite summer and fall pictures are of those streets with leaves covering the road and tree branches arching over them.
Some of the streets in one of the cities we used to live, (and even a couple here, amazingly, as this is not a happy place for trees, generally) were quite lovely for the American elms planted on either side of the streets, whose arching branches met high above the street level. The neighborhood was also lovely for the unique, old, "character" houses that lined those streets... we lived on the outskirts of that neighborhood, where the later housing styles (late 1940's) kind of ran out of that interesting sort of character, unfortunately (though rich by comparison with our current neighorhood!)... the elms were still lovely though, if not quite forming a solid canopy.
Aaaaah. Autumn bliss.
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