CHAPTER III 

 Making the Rock Garden 



WHERE shall we make the rock garden ? Often 

 enough the considerations of space provide an 

 easy and final answer to the question. After all, it does 

 not matter very much, providing certain elementary 

 principles, such as appeal to the common-sense gardener, 

 are kept in mind and are not infringed. One should 

 avoid positions that are shady, wind-swept, under the 

 drip of trees, or damp. Sunshine is, above all things, 

 essential to success with mountain flowers, and the 

 great majority of them cannot be grown satisfactorily 

 in its absence. It is true that some rock-garden flowers, 

 though comparatively few true alpines, require shade, 

 but it is a simple matter to arrange for this when building. 

 In fact, as the formation of the rock garden proceeds, 

 the varying needs of the different plants should be 

 always in mind, and provision made for them. It is 

 poor rock-gardening to build in haphazard fashion with- 

 out considering the exigencies of the flowers. The un- 

 initiated reader is strongly advised to get to know some- 

 thing about the plants before he starts building ; he 

 will then build all the more finely. This sounds very 

 much like the advice given by some of the golfing books, 



