The Rock Garden

At the end of September of our first year here, (2017) I finally tackled the Rock Garden, formerly known as "The Snake Habitat". It was a weedy, overgrown mess, full of brambles, small poplars, and clumps of sad, congested day lilies.

I laid a tarp down and started by digging up the lily roots, and putting them on the tarp. Spadeful by spadeful, I dug up the grass and pried out the little trees, carting many wheel-barrow loads back to the brush pile down the adjacent bush trail, and discovered that, yes, indeed....it was a rock garden! The two large immovable rocks at either end had been the starting point for piling more and more rocks..a literal rock garden. At some point, someone had thrown a bit of soil over it all and planted some lilies. From an e-mail to a friend back then, a quote:

"Today, I tackled the 'snake habitat'. It is cleared out! What a job. I ache. A tiny little guy came moseying along just as I was calling it a day. He looked so lost, I felt a pang of regret, but, its not like there are no other rock piles around!" 

I spent the better part of the next day prying up rocks, and trying to level the soil out. There was no way I was going to remove all the rocks, although I made a good attempt, and Hubby will attest to the fact that he carted off 3 ATV trailer loads to fill holes on the bush trails. I saved rocks that I thought would be good to border the sides between the end behemoths, and also did some scouting around to find more. I shook the lily roots out, making sure there were no weed or grass roots in the clumps, replanted them along the back side and watered them in well. I then had a pretty much barren garden-scape. Its been a work in progress...still is. A wonderful surprise the next spring, was the emergence of a bud from one of the lily clumps that was a little different, not your run of the mill day lily. I have since separated it out and given it its own space, and this year there are 4 buds rising up! A beautiful, apricot coloured lily.

I have creeping thyme spilling over the sides now, a pretty red dianthus, (a red version of Maiden Pinks), and herbs that prefer a dryer space, sage, lavender, thyme and rosemary.