Rock Garden spring

Rock gardens

THE ROCK GARDENS

Rock gardening, for us, is an effort to replicate growing conditions found in the high mountains and in steep stony places at lower elevations. In this we do not always succeed, but we are forever hopeful. We try to keep in mind the three principles of rock gardening; drainage, drainage and drainage.

The rock gardens at Cady’s Falls are in varying stages of youthful exuberance and middle age decadence. Many of the earliest plantings from the 1980’s have been crowded out by not-so-dwarf, dwarf conifers. In our most recent rock gardens, having hopefully learned the conifer lesson, we are limiting ourselves to alpines of compact habit, accompanied by a sparse selection of the most diminutive woody plants we can find.

We have created lots of different eco-niches to try to satisfy a wide variety of plants from around the world. The soil conditions in our rock gardens range from simple grit enhanced native soil, to nearly pure river stone enhanced with composted leaves, to pure tufa rock. We have sunny, but sheltered north facing slopes, south facing hot spots and shady niches in close proximity. We have added limestone for alkaline beds and other places we have turned in nothing but peat moss to satisfy acid loving plants. We even have some favorite, wet, moss-covered rocks where the sticky leaved butterworts have seeded in.