IRISH GARDENING 



Notes on Moraine Gardening. 



By Murray Hornibrook, Knapton, Abbeyleix. 



The cultivation of Alpines in. so called, moraines 

 is still, for most of us. in its experimental stage. 

 Increasing experience has taught me to believe 

 that there is no other method of gardening which 

 calls for such careful attention to the results of 

 personal experiments and such disregard to all 

 hard and fast rules and written instrvictions. 

 One authority will tell you to make your mor- 

 aines from stone chips with " just a trace " of 

 Boll ; another advises a much stronger mix- 

 ture, artificial irrigation and a concrete 

 tank. 



These diverse instructions bewilder the moraine 

 disciple, until he realises that authority No. 1 

 must live in a jjlace having a heavy annual rain- 

 fall, while No. 2 must reside in a spot where he 

 suffers occasionally from drought. The wise 

 man experiments with various mixtures until he 

 hits u])on that which is most suitable to his own 

 climatic conditions. 



I have experimental moraines of limestone 

 mixtvires and granite mixtures in varying pro- 

 portions, from stone chips 2 in 3 to pvire stone 

 chijis : there are also moraines comjjosed of local 

 gravel (unbroken) plus soil. Although some of 

 these moraines date back to 1910, very few of the 

 plants are particularly strong, as they are con- 

 stantly shifted from one to another to test the 

 suitability of the mixture ; for instance, Doug- 

 lasia vitaliana throve in moraine composed of 

 broken slate — 3 in 5 — but never flowered. In 

 the hope of forcing it to flower, it was then 

 placed on a starvation diet in a moraine of gravel, 

 3 to 1. Here it bore four flowers, but almo.st 

 expired from drought last summer. It is now 

 fairly convalescent in a similar but rather richer 

 moraine. Some ])lants are at home at once, 

 others are difficult to please. I have not yet 

 succeeded in establishing Campanula excisa or 

 C. morettiana. but C. alpestris (C. allioni) — the 

 the lime hater — grows steadily in pure limestone 

 chips. Other plants succeeding here in pure 

 limestone are Edraianthus pumilio, E. caudatus, 

 E. dinaricus, E. Kitaibelii, Chaenorrhinum 

 (Linaria) glareosum, Androsace villosa, Douglasia 

 laevigata, Thlasx)i cepesefolium, T. limosellifolium, 

 T. rotundifolium. Campanula stenocodon, C. 

 acutangula, C. mirabilis, Saxifraga squarrosa, S. 

 patens, S. Fosteri, Acantholimon acerosum, A. 

 lei)turoides, ^Ethionema antitaurus, A. aloides. 

 A. cordatum, Potentilla nitida. Convolvulus 

 nitidus, Veronica bombycina, Saponaria lutea, 

 S. Wienmanniana, Geranium sessilifiorum, Viola 

 olympica, Helichrysum frigidum. 



In limestone, 3-1, all the good Engleria Saxi- 

 fragas, also S. Borisii, S. Kyrilli, S. Petraschi, 

 Androsace albana, Campanula raddeana, Bellium 

 bellidioides, Dianthus sylvestris, D. superbus, 

 Stachys Corsica. In limestone road grit 3, 

 Erinus alpinus, Viola cucullata. In gravel 3, 

 peat and leaf soil 1, Alyssum spinosum, A. Born- 

 mulleri, A. serpyllifolium, Arabis Androsace, A. 

 Sturii, Papaver al])inum Dianthus Lereschei, D. 

 arenarius, D. gelidus, D. gallicus, D. Freynii, 

 Draba dicranoides, D. ciliata, D. Salomoni, D. 

 brunsefolia, D. borealis. Campanula alpina, C. 

 Raineri. C. Waldsteiniana, C. Aucheri, 8ym- 

 phiandra Wanneri, Armeria csespitosa. 



In granite 1. leaf -mould 1. Sax. la^vis. Viola 

 Zoysi. Wahlenbergia albo-marginata. Callianthe- 

 mum anemonoides, Arenaria ledebouriana, 

 Omphalodes Luciliae, Saxifraga lilacina. 



The granite moraine is in half shade, the others 

 in the sun. I find that the majority of i)lants 

 here prefer a fairly coarse mixture — stone chips 

 of from 1 inch to 1 i inches long. If the mixture 

 be too fine, evaporation is too rapid in the spring 

 (when the arrival of the parching winds unfor- 

 tunately coincides with the growing period). If 

 the material be coarse enough, and the mixture 

 be a suitable one for the climatic conditions of 

 the garden in which it is situated, the plants will, 

 with few exceptions, practically look after them- 

 selves, and the only further assistance one can 

 give them is to make the moraine at least undu- 

 lating in form. 



I have heard people say " I would like a mor- 

 aine, but I have not made one, as they are such 

 eye-sores." Unfortunately, this is too true of 

 the majority of moraines, and yet there is no 

 reason why they should be eye-sores. I do not 

 know to whom we are indebted for the idea of 

 the flat-sunk moraine bed. with slabs of stone 

 sunk in it flush with the surface, but it certainly 

 has been the model for the majority of the mor- 

 aines I have seen. It is not only needlessly ugly, 

 but also needlessly adds to the difficulties of cul- 

 tivation. In a dead level moraine bed each 

 ■jjlant receives from nature an equal amovmt of 

 moisture, irrespective of its requirements. The 

 bed has. therefore, to be made of a mixture suit- 

 able to the requirements of the drought lovers, 

 and the moisture lovers have to be assisted by 

 hand watering. One has only to recall the dis- 

 similar requirements of such plants as Silene 

 Elizabethae and Campanula velutina to realise 

 the difficulty of finding suitable situations for 

 the plants in a flat bed. If, on the other hand, 

 the moraine be made to flow down naturally 

 from a height, the slopes bolstered up by large 

 retaining stones, and whole moraine undulating — 

 hills and hollows — the plant must be very cap- 

 ricious for which a spot — dry or moist, which- 

 ever it i)refers — cannot be found, and. further- 

 more, such a moraine, so far from being an 

 " eye-sore," looks natural, and works into the 

 general scheme of the rockwork. 



The condition of the ])lants in some of the 

 " flat-bed " moraines, such as those of Glasnevin 

 and Lissadell, is. no doubt, a joy to behold, but 

 that condition could not be attained without the 

 constant attention of the man with the watering 

 can, and the aim of the rock gardener — not only 

 for reasons of economy, but as a matter of prin- 

 ciple — should be to endeavour to grow his plants 

 by the exercise of such skill in planting, and fore- 

 thought as to soil and situation, that no artificial 

 watering should be necessary. The sloping 

 moraine is not difficult to make, and its large 

 retaining stones — which can be utilised with 

 effect even in the more or less flat portion at the 

 base — not only look as attractive as the flat sunk 

 " slabs " look unattractive, but have the addi- 

 tional advantages of being firm to walk on, and, 

 by their contours, to relieve the surface of the 

 moraine from that aiJ])earance of having been 

 daily carefully watered and rolled which so many 

 of them possess. 



I^ater on I hope to give some notes on some of 

 the newer ])lants suitable for growing in 

 moraines. 



