Our Stony garden

[Darren]

In the Northern Hemisphere June 2010 thread Cohan commented that he liked our stony garden.  It didn't start out stony but as we dug up the lawns we realised that there was very little soil depth under the turf, (approx 1 to 8 inch depth) and  if wanted to plant anything we would need to increase the soil depth.  This involved removing the top soil from some areas of the garden and piling it up to create island beds, which were topped up with the loam created by rotting down the lawns.  This left the stoney / sandy subsoil exposed in the areas we identified as paths.  The rounded stones we found during all this work were used to line these paths to create dry stream beds.  The limestone fragments / sheets we used to create and top dress a rock garden.  This left some very nice pieces of water worn limestone which we later used to create a pavement area with planting crevices.  The remaining pieces are going to be used for a fernery which we are currently planning in the one shady area of the garden.

The first set of pictures shows the garden as it was when we moved into the house 6 years ago and the development of the paths / stream beds.

None of the stone shown here was imported. (except the sandstone which we are using to hold down the landscape fabric)

(Apologies if some of these pictures have been posted before).

[Darren]

The rock garden under construction.  In the top level at the centre of the picture you can see the Cistus and the Ferula from my original post in the Northern Hemisphere June 2010 thread.

Over time the stone has weathered to match and has lost the alarming yellow colour.

[Darren]

The nicer pieces of water worn stone were used to create a pavement area at the end of the dry stream bed. 

I don't know why this stuff was so popular for rock gardens in the past as it is actually very hard to make look remotely natural in a garden setting.

[Darren]

and last but not least the patio. 

The first picture shows the "soil" profile during the excavation, the garden is approx 80 cm higher than the patio at this point.  To the left of the photo you can see a boulder that we decided we would make into a feature rather than try to remove it!

The second photo shows the finished patio, the stone for the wall and paving was imported into the garden.  The wall is free standing and backs directly onto the garden soil, so as you can imagine we have stuffed all sorts of plants into the gaps to see what will grow!  So far only the sedums have taken.

[Maggi Young]

Well, Darren, if this doesn't prove instructive for folks looking for ideas to develop a sloping site, I don't know what will 

I think it's a bit feeble of you to have left that stone at the patio, though..... little thing like that should have shifted no bother.... with a stick or two of dynamite!

[SusanS]

Darren wouldn't let me try that, the meanie 

[Maggi Young]

Darren wouldn't let me try that, the meanie 

I expect he had all sorts of excuses about blowing up the house, killing the neighbours etc?  Or perhaps he just didn't have any dynamite............

[angie]

Well Darren and Susan l really enjoyed seeing your garden take shape. There must have been some sore backs getting all those stone set out.
l like the idea of the dry steam bed, its great to see what others have done and pinch a idea or two

Angie

[cohan]

i love it
having neither, i am especially jealous of your boulder and limestone!
i guess people always want what they don't have, and i suppose there have been many gardeners who cursed their rocky sites, but i always thought it would be easier to bring in organic soil where needed than to bring in rocks/gravel when they don't exist!

i do have some piles of round, mixed stones probably brought from elsewhere on the farm, over the years, but it remains to be seen whether it's enough, and no gravel/grit/sand... still have to source it...

in the spirit of working with what you have, however, i am developing woodland beds based on piles of leaves, branches and rotting logs and branches!

[Paul T]

Wow, that has been an impressive undertaking.  The final results are just brilliant.  Your dry creek bed look has worked a treat.  Congratulations!!

[arillady]

What an amazing undertaking 
What are your backs like now. Might be a bit hard on the soles of the feet to go barefoot in summer.

[Luc Gilgemyn]

Wonderful job Darren and Susan !
Must have been a backbraking task but so rewarding when you look at the results.
Great thing that you could use your very own rock - out here, it would cost you an arm and a leg to buy that amount of rock !
Congrats on the outcome - I wouldn't mind having a drink on that patio... 

[Anthony Darby]

I like the patio wall. Something you cobbled together?

[SusanS]

Hi everyone, thank you for your kind comments. 

Whilst the garden looks like it would be back breaking to create it wasn't too bad, most of the strain was on our hands and arms.  As well as the loose stones in the soil there was also a limestone sheet running diagonally across the garden.  This had been fractured in the past making it relatively easy     to pry apart using a 6 foot long iron bar, removing this enabled us to add an extra 10 to 12 inch depth of soil to the raised beds.  As well as providing some rather nice stone for top dressing the rockery areas.  We took about 15 months to get the main garden layout in place as we had lots of other jobs    to get on with as well having just moved into the house.

Angie - we got the idea of using dry streambeds as a path / planting area after seeing a lecture by Vic Aspland, he showed a trackway which was full of crocus in springtime.

Cohan - we did curse our stony garden many times, normally after a particular busy weekend  The one incident that springs to mind was when we dug out the pond.  During excavation we discovered a perfectly round limestone boulder.  We couldn't lift it so decided to remove it by rolling it up the slope in the pond and onto the beach area.  Of course being round it moved reasonably easily - unfortunately not always in the direction we wanted!  It took us nearly all day to finally get it out of the pond and on to the flat. 

Anthony - a local lad called Andrew Mason built the patio wall for us.  The stone for it turned up in nice neat rectangular blocks which he then broke into pieces to create a more natural  random looking wall.

[gote]

I thought that I was moving big stones but your boulder beats me. 
The result of your work is amazing. The dry stream bed is an ingenious idea.
It looks as one of the best designs I have seen. I look forward to seeing more pics when the plantings are biger.
Cheers
göte