Photos: New Rocks

[ysabetwordsmith]

Today I planted most of my new rocks! \o/ I'm waiting to sink the pink mica rock until I get a second one to point the other direction along the road, to catch headlights from both ways.


The house yard has greened up considerably since the rain last night.




The rain garden is blooming beautifully. Some of the solid purple crocuses have come in. Leaves of heuchera (upper right corner, purple) and columbine (center, creamy green) are more visible too.




The goddess garden has new flowers blooming.




Winter aconite has come late to the party. Often it's the first thing blooming.




The orange crocuses have started to bloom. They were more open earlier in the day, but close quickly on a cloudy day.




I have installed the fossil rock in the forest garden.




Here is a closer view of the fossil rock. You can see that I've buried the bottom quarter to third of it.




This is a closeup of the fossil. It may be a leaf, a fan coral, or something else.




Bluebells are sprouting in the forest garden. Their leaves look almost purple at this early stage. This is the first wildflower to emerge.




In the cistern garden, chives are sprouting.




These are perennial leeks. I got them from the Charleston Food Forest.




French sorrel is well up and almost big enough to harvest. I love this stuff; it has a bright lemon flavor.




I seated the new cobblestones around the purple-and-white garden.




These are the new cobblestones.




I also adjusted some of the older stones to make a more coherent border.

Comments

[kaishin108]

I love the rocks!

We had some huge ones delivered last year, boulder size and I love how they are covered with moss. :)

Yes ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

I love boulders and mossy rocks too. We do have some modest-size boulders in a few of the beds and along the edge of the parking lot.

When adding new ones, I generally prefer the size that I can carry by myself, or at most, carry between two people. That doesn't require special equipment. We can wrangle it into a wheelbarrow and then into place.

Much heavier than that, and it starts to become a good idea to involve rigging or rollers or some other weight-management system -- let alone the really big ones that need a front-loader, crane, or other construction equipment.

The ones I've bought aren't the best candidates for a mossy rock. The cobbles would be okay, but they are worn quite smooth, which makes it a little harder for moss to start. And I don't want the fossils or mica covered. But I do love a mossy rock, so I may keep an eye out for ones with better potential.

I have lots of moss around my yard, and some mossy bricks, so if I need to make a moss culture slurry then I have plenty of materials. What I'm actually thinking of trying is growing moss on cotton pads. I saw a video of someone making a "tree" with a dead branch and several aquarium moss balls (actually a type of algae). I think I could do that with a terrarium -- if I could get moss to grow on something that would rest on a branch well. I've seen moss growing on old cloth, doormats, etc. so it seems worth a try.

Re: Yes ...

[kaishin108]

That is a great idea trying to grow moss, I just love it. A terrarium, that would be a fun project. I am going to do some thinking about that, thank you!

We have a corner city lot and we had the side yard professional landscaped by the company I used to work for. I went to the boulder store, hee hee. I picked them out and they delivered them in the driveway and then the landscaper used a little bobcat and put them in place. There are 5 large ones. Maybe 700 to 900 lbs each. They are native basalt boulders. And also a good Feng Shui correction as we get quite a few U-turns right at our driveway and the culdesac because of a popular coffee shop about 5 blocks away.