Crevice Gardening ......in defence of rock.....

[Luc Gilgemyn]

... and this is how the Pershore crevice garden looked in May 2009 - sorry only one picture... 

[Lesley Cox]

The whole thread is really valuable and of greatest interest. Thanks Luit, Alan and Luc for the great Pershore pictures. The troughs are very fine too, as well as the crevices. I especially like the trough with the Castilleja. There's a small WEED in there. Very comforting.

[David Nicholson]

I too have really enjoyed this thread and have been left, perhaps, a little overawed by the very scale of some of the examples ZZ has shown us and indeed of the likely cost of trying to create something like them here. Luit and Lucs pics of the crevice garden at Pershore though prove that a more modest project, in size and cost, is a distinct possiblity for next year Anyone any rocks to spare?

[krisderaeymaeker]

I have greatly enjoyed this thread, thanks for ZZ for his dedication to the task of putting the thread together and much appreciated humour   

This thread is pure  "rock& roll" for us.  The  "rolling stones"  are never farr off.
Stonerider, thanks for taking us back to "Stone  Age" .This is fantastic.
Also many thanks to all the others ,for  the beautifull pictures ....,some became even very lyrical.
ZZ even open a person's eyes .......   

[Stone Rider]

... and this is how the Pershore crevice garden looked in May 2009 - sorry only one picture... 

Lucky shot Luc! I would pull out this white Achillea. It is too big for the size of this construction. Thanks ZZ

[Stone Rider]

I haven't planted my new troughs yet but before I do, I'm thinking a trip up country for some crevice-type rock would be a good idea.

you have somewhere limestone areas and this kind of rock is the best for friendly bacteria cooperation with saxatile plants. Ohoy Zdenek

Thanks for that advice Zdenek. I was thinking of schist actually, approximately the same colour as my troughs and superbly lichened and weathered. There's masses of it in an area just an hour or so away from me.

On the other hand I have a collection of limestone slabs which though too big for the troughs would make a good small crevice garden somewhere nearby. I think they were originally paving stones but never used and when we moved from our previous place we brought them with us "just in case." There are about 30 I think, overgrown but retrievable and well weathered already. (They've been sitting there for 12 years.) They are approx 10cms thick and about 60-80cms square, more or less. If the garden were not to be very high, they could be broken in half and so make twice as many of them. I have some limestone troughs too, carved out of the natural stone, quarried in blocks and a lot of long limestone bricks (to the top and right of the pic below)

In the opening article is a photo of Vojtech Holubec working with sandstone desks in Dortmund. One right corner is always seen. Do not broke these perfect slabs. ZZ

[Stone Rider]

IRREGULAR  IGNEOUS  ROCK (Post Scriptum to the Show)

  I must share my spring (2009) struggle with nicely colored but badly shaped stones in Southern Austria near Graz. Fritz Kummert, the star of hybridizing Daphnes, gave me very limited space around his new alpine house.
We got lovely mineral sand-like soil and the local stone.
The only way how to work with this kind of stones is again to try to set them into layers of different width, parallel each to other.
Fritz got a lot of crevices (the rockwork goes around the alpine house) but I have fear that he will put taller plants there because he is gardener loving all unusual (curious) plants.

[Lesley Cox]

ZZ, I'm not sure where you mean. I'd like to see this photograph as it will give me a better idea of how to use my slabs. Can you point me in the right directtion please? Perhaps a link? Thanks.

[Lesley Cox]

I really like the second picture there, a glasshouse arising from the rock as if pushed up by some (quite gentle) earthquake.

[Maggi Young]

Lesley, I believe these are the photos ZZ means from the pdfs listed at the beginning of this thread....  they show bigger pieces of limestone, like yours, being used in one piece, not broken up.....
...... the quality is not great, they are taken from the pdf scan of the Journal  

click to enlarge......

[Stone Rider]

Lesley, I believe these are the photos ZZ means from the pdfs listed at the beginning of this thread....  they show bigger pieces of limestone, like yours, being used in one piece, not broken up.....
...... the quality is not great, they are taken from the pdf scan of the Journal 

click to enlarge......

Thanks Maggi, it is the lower picture and it is not limestone but sandstone in Dortmund. ZZ

[Maggi Young]

Thanks, ZZ, I've made the correction. 

[Lesley Cox]

Thanks to you both. I did look at those but seem to have missed the lower one, or at least its significance. I see what you mean Zdenek about the right angles. Of course the rock work will be done by me and maybe Roger, not by Vojtech so the result won't be as good, but I see that such an arrangement makes for a sunny side and a perhaps damper, slightly shaded side, or at least away from direct heat.Two aspects making for a different or extended range of plants. I wish I'd done all this 40 years ago when muscles, back, knees et al, were all in better working order.

[Ron and Joan Beeston]

It has given me enormous pleasure to see posted images of Zdenek’s latest mind- blowing crevice creations and I am told that the task of planting up his latest example at Bangsbo Botanic Garden is a 2-year project. Pictures give a good idea of the forces employed in what is only the first stage leaving planting and infill or topdressing in the hands of the delighted (or awestruck) beneficiary.
It has been my good fortune to visit the Czech Republic on several occasions and to see unbelievable work by a growers who were pioneers in the work. I mention only two:
(First two images)
Ota Vlasek makes beautiful use of granite and the first two images try to illustrate the vertical stratification in relatively small outcrops. Perfectly matching  “rotten granite” packed into crevices and for the topdressing give a perfectly natural look to this very large rock garden. Ota told me he had spent two whole days planting and packing an area of one square metre of the rock face.
(Second pair of images)
Milan Cepicka has filled his relatively small garden with limestone (I would guess about 20 tons) and I will let the camera speak for me. This is a case of art concealing the crevices and I think this man should placed in front of camera so that his skills may be captured as a master class
Returning home Zdenek employed basalt across the Irish Sea and Derbyshire tufa in my own garden (another story) but so far as I know sandstone elsewhere. I am not experienced enough to know of the whereabouts of the considerable amount of the crumbling, splitting sandstone (which Z would describe as flakes) required for filling purposes and the small amount
available from the quarry for the Pershore project was sufficient for only a little over half the task. Enquiries elsewhere were fruitless. I illustrate what we did achieve through the work of an inspired hand but unfortunately I left the scene before investigating alternatives, which included the possibly futile task of the breakdown of larger stone. A more satisfactory plan would probably be to follow Alan Furness’s route with a matching sandstone aggregate although I am waiting to see if the surprising choice of a standard potting grit by the AGS may prove the more satisfactory of all. My opinion is that the unselfish work and craftsmanship of a Czech master deserves in return all the art and skill that can be mustered to ensure that with age it look as if it was a natural creation.

[Lvandelft]

Ron and Joan, a very welcome to the Forum from Holland.
Now that you've made it up here at last  , I am hopeful to see many more comments and pictures.