154 



CASSELL'S POPULAfl GAEDENING. 



ROCK, ALPINE, FERN, AND WILD 

 GARDENING. 



ALPINE PLANTS. 

 By Edward W. Badger, F.R.H.S. 



Rock Mounds and Beds.— There are many 

 small gardens where the rock borders, and the still 

 more extensive rockeries contemplated in the fore- 

 going remarks, would he out of place, or for which 

 sufficient room could not he found. In such gardens 

 only a small space can be set apart for an Alpinery, 

 and this must usually take the form of a single bed 

 or mound, or perhaps two at most. In these cases, 

 the choicest Alpine gems should have the preference, 

 and no trouble be stinted to insure their successful 

 cultivation. It is fortunate that some of the love- 

 liest of these plants may be grown in perfection under 

 such a variety of cii'cumstances, that the humblest 

 amateur may undertake the cultivation of a select 

 collection of them, with the fullest assurance that 

 they will thrive in his garden as V7ell as in the ex- 

 tensive grounds of the neighbom-ing peer, provided 

 he will be at a little trouble. The remarks on the 

 preparation of rock borders and the formation of 

 pockets (see page 77) contain all the information 

 which any intelhgent person would require in order 

 to make the best kind of bed or mound for growing 

 Alpines. A sufficient depth of soil to cifford ample 

 room for deeply penetrating roots to wander at will ; 

 soil of the proper kind to yield a supply of the neces- 

 sary food and to retain moisture in sufficient degree ; 

 isolation of one plant from another by the stones 

 used to form the pockets ; the prevention of over- 

 crowding or the preponderance of strong-growing 

 plants over weaker-growing ones; never allowing 

 the plants to get dry at the roots during the grow- 

 ing months, and preventing the stagnation of water 

 about the roots when the plants are at rest : these 

 are the conditions of success for the grower of a 

 small number of plants, as well as for one who has 

 room for a full collection; and the results, other 

 things being equal, will be as satisfactory in the one 

 case as the other. 



The rock mound or bed should be in a fully 

 exposed position, away from the shade of trees 

 and walls, open to every ray of sunshine and all 

 the rain that falls. Its shape is of no moment 

 so long as it harmonises with its surroundings; 

 and the more it can be made to assume the ap- 

 pearance of a natural outgrowth of the position 

 occupied, the greater will be the charm of it. The 

 smaller it is, the more the need to keep it moderate 

 in height ; for though it is an advantage for it to be 

 above the general level of the surrounding garden, 

 it would be a great disadvantage to make it so high 



in proportion to its size as to unduly expose too 

 large a suii'ace to the drying effects of a parching 

 east wind or broiling sunshine. This is a point to 

 be insisted on, because the bulk of small rockeries 

 are invariably made higher than is proper. It is 

 possible to make a very attractive rock mound on a 

 small scale. This is to be done by raising the 

 surface a foot or eighteen inches above the level of 

 the surrounding surface, margining the outline with 

 stones so as to define the bed and provide places for 

 plants which thrive better in a dependent position, 

 and then making the remainder of the surface into 

 as many pockets as there is room for, according to 

 the size and rate of gTOwth of the plants which 

 it is intended to use. 



A very charming bed might be made if no other 

 genus than Saxifraga were used to plant it. Using 

 the various forms of the generic type of Saxifrage, 

 of which London Pride is the best-known repre- 

 sentative, for the margins, and for the next tier 

 some of the closer-growing moss-like species such 

 as S. atropurpiirea, Wallacei, &c., and then in 

 the higher parts planting some of the encrusted 

 forms from the larger S. longifoUa and pyramldalis 

 down to the tiny ccBsia, with an intermingling of 

 plants of the oppositifolia section, where they could 

 rest on a ledge of stone and hang down in front of 

 it, a collection of lovely plants, whether in or out of 

 flower, would be brought together and, as it were, 

 focussed for observation, which could not fail to 

 please at all seasons of the year. But where more 

 variety is desired, as it wdll be in most places, the 

 Saxifrages may be intermingled with Sempervivums, 

 the smaller Campanulas, such as S. pulla, pumila 

 (white and blue), carpatica, muralis, and turbinata, 

 a few of the dwarfer bulbous plants (Snowdrops, 

 Crocuses, Scillas, Chionodoxa Lucilice), some of the 

 smaller Dianthnses, Gentians, and Hepaticas, or any 

 of the many dwarf and compact- growing plants 

 which will be named later on in our selection of 

 Alpine plants for general use. We should advise 

 young beginners to content themselves at first with 

 some of the plants most easily grown, and which will 

 be marked with an asterisk (*) in our selected list. 

 When they have grown these successfully and 

 gained experience, they will be able to adventure 

 with more confidence on the cultivation of more 

 difficult plants. 



Natural Rockeries.— There are many gardens 

 in this country, situated on hillsides and elsewhere, 

 in which there exist possibilities needing only to 

 be used to be converted into natural rockeries which 

 would far surpass any artificial ones capable of con- 

 struction at ten times the expense these would cost. 

 Wherever the underlying rock, whether sandstone, 



