Advice/Help with rockery neeed

[Catherine]

Hi, after moving to a house with a very large garden I have made a patio area at the back and have a half circle on the end. To square this off I am splitting it into 3 area and want to fill these areas with different ideas. One part is going to be a rockery and I got around 3 ton of rockery stone in the front drive to get started. Now the hard bit I have no idea of how to build the rockery, what I need to put on the inside but have wonderful fancy ideas of water coming down the rocks and all different plants full of colour and various designs growing in the rockery. All sounds great and works in my head but dont know where to start, what plants I can put, where to get them from, how to build the rockery, etc. etc. Sure it will look great when I get some good advice so I dont want to start the rockery and then find out its all wrong and have to pull it down again - need to get it right from the beginning. Plus it all needs to be child friendly as I have a little 2 year old who is sure to try and climb up the rocks before long. Any help, advice, websites, references, etc. would be greatly appreciated.

[B35]

Hi Catherine...welcome to gardening exhange!

3 ton of rockery stone? Is it a rockery you are looking to build or a mountain pass :-)

The simple way to build a rockery is to create a good mound with topsoil and then just simply place the rocks on the mound higgledy piggledy... I've done this in the past by simply throwing the rocks at the mound (loads of fun). This way there will be a natural settlement that will leave spaces for you to place your plants.

From your child's perspective the only safety measures you can take are not building the rockery too high, and trying to ensure that any sharp rock edges are pointing inwards towards the soil.

Rockery's do make a great feature in a garden and when planted well with a variation of colourful heathers, ferns and succulents they look really nice.

Best of luck!

Michael