Backyard Rock Gardens
Rock gardens with a running stream are easier than you think to build, they will add a comforting sound and much beauty to your landscape or garden and if a pond is added use gold fish and water plants to bring more life to it.
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Rock gardens are frequently built in garden areas specifically chosen for this purpose. It will be better built on ground you have no other use for. The only requirement is there must be good drainage since rock and mountain growing plants don't do well in water soaked soil.
The base for a rock garden should be a sloping area where surface water can run off easily. The water presence is not the problem its the inability to run off. Rock gardens are associated with natural and artificial streams, running water is the natural habitat of many plants used to populate rock gardens.
The base soil for rock gardens should be gritty rather than well compacted so it will simulate the natural environment of the plants, the plants themselves should be bedded in rich soil to help them establish. Rock gardens are also known as alpine gardens, which are known for excellent drainage throw the soil.
Rock gardens should not be confused with a currant bun, which is built by sticking rocks into a mound of dirt. After you chose where you are going to build, the area then should be excavated and the bottom of the rock garden lined with stones. Then one or two largerocks should be laid which will protrude above the surface when the garden has been completed. These are main rocks, around which other rocks and stones can be laid.
The space between all the rocks will be filled with increasingly smaller stones and finished with a grittyeasily draining soil. Drainage again is very important for good rock gardens, mixing sand with the soil is a way to get good drainage.
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The best stone for rock gardens is lime stone but granite any any local stone will work. Once the garden is set up, fix pockets among the rocks and fill with good composted soil in which you will place plants.
For rock gardens you again can mix soil with washed sand, then purchase bedding plants that you will be using. Alyssum, delosperma, yeraniums and verlena all will work well in rock gardens.
What you must do to have a successful rock garden is to make sure that the foundation is firstbuilt, then the drainage and gritty soil, next make small pockets for plants between the rocks and fill with compost and place the plants.
You can construct a running stream with polythene some one inch plastic piping and a good water pump. Lay the polythene between the rocks and stones, leading to a small pool or pond from which the water can be pumped back up to the top.
Rock gardens will add much beauty to your garden, pond and landscape.
