Many home gardeners are adding a rock garden to their landscape design, not just because it gives an interesting physical variety to the landscape, but because it provides an opportunity for the development of one of our most interesting groups of plants. Rock gardens showcase those plants which grow their best and prove most interesting in a miniature landscape with rocky features.

The group of plants valuable for the development of rock garden work is comparatively little known to the amateur gardener although many rock garden plants are often used for other purposes. It is true that many of the plants grown for rock gardens are very dwarf in their habit of growth and much more sensitive to changed conditions of soil and exposure, and that many of them therefore require expert labor for their normal development.

The most interesting group of plants for rock garden work includes the plants known as "alpine" plants, which are low-growing, very dense, and compact in their habit of growth. Most of these plants have small leaves and the flowers are rather brilliant and marked in their colors. The term "alpine" plants today is applied in its general use to that dwarf and low-growing group of plants which have a tendency to compactness of habit, and which in their mature form of development seem to fit into the confined atmosphere of the average rock garden.

The true rock garden plants may perhaps be the "alpine" types, but those plants which landscape architects use today for rock garden purposes include not only the alpine types but many other small plants, even though they come from the lowlands, from the woods, or from the more arid desert sections. There are a few of the tall-growing types of plants, such as foxgloves and some of the single roses, which, though not dwarf in character, are admirably fitted to the scale of rock garden work.

Not every plant which is dwarf in its habit of growth is desirable for the rock garden. Many of these dwarf plants are extremely undesirable, such as the creeping Jenny (lysimachia) and dead nettle (lamium maculatum), mostly because of their tendency to grow rampant and to crowd out and smother many of the more sensitive and more beautiful types of rock garden plants. These plants are also difficult to eradicate from the garden once they become established. They should never be used except in a rock garden on an extensive scale where the tendency to spread will not eventually become offensive.

In order to maintain the true rock garden character it is very essential that plants should be selected which are in harmony with the spirit of the garden. Many so-called rock gardens are filled with the more common annuals — sweet williams, phlox, hollyhocks, and even large irises — plants which belong to an entirely different type of garden, or which, because of their size, are not in keeping with the scale of a minutely detailed rock garden.

It is not necessary in the development of an interesting rock garden to use a large quantity of different types of plants. The success of a rock garden is dependent largely upon the ability of the designer to select proper types of plants for a specific purpose, whether the rock garden be very small and occupying only a corner of the lawn, or whether it be an extensive area in some wooded portion of the property. Such plants as hydrangeas, spireas, petunias, and many plants of these types which the gardener has often seen in rock garden work, give evidence immediately of the lack of knowledge of plants and of their proper usage. It is true also that the plants which are used in rock gardens require an amount of care in their maintenance equal to that given plants in the more refined and formal types of garden work.

One of the most successful ways for obtaining good rock garden plants is to grow them from seed. It is often easier to seed plants in rock garden groups than it is to plant nursery-grown stock.

Free Garden Design Software

If your want to take your garden design to the next level then download free garden design software. Save time by utilizing 3D software for planning a garden or backyard landscape. Choose bushes and shrubs; design a flower garden, layout a sprinkler system … all on your computer.

Download Free Landscape Design Software

Evergreens for a Rock Garden

In designing a rock garden, a touch of evergreen foliage, the texture of which is peculiar to evergreen plantings, is essential to lend the desired interest to the garden. Choose from this list for a successful rock garden.

Evergreen Plants for Use in a Rock Garden

Perennials for a Rock Garden

Perennials for Use in a Rock Garden