Western Morning News (Saturday)
An alpine adventure
These hardy plants are a really beautiful addition to any spring garden – but you need to do your preparation work now
THERE’S nothing quite like winter for making you revise your gardening plans, and a spell of cold weather tends to focus thoughts on Mother Nature’s very own sports species – alpines.
I’m a great fan of these little beauties, but the way we’ve grown them has changed mightily. Forget the old 50s-style rockeries, made by topping a shed-load of rubbish with purple aubrieta and sitting back while the ground elder took over – today’s alpine garden is far more attractive and practical.
What you really want is a raised bed – they are very adaptable. Simply design one to suit the rest of your garden.
An island bed in a teardrop shape, made with low dry-stone walls, would be ideal for an informal cottage garden, while a rectangular horse trough, made of old red bricks, railway sleepers or reconstituted stone-walling blocks, is a creative way of filling dead space next to a wall, greenhouse or out on a patio.
Whatever you choose, it pays to put a path alongside for easy access in all weathers. You could get someone in to do the job, but if you are halfway handy you could do it yourself. And now is the time to get construction under way so you are ready for planting early in spring – just right for the annual explosion of alpine flowers. First find your spot.
Alpines need plenty of sun and a certain amount of protection. Although you’d expect mountain plants to tolerate strong winds and exposure, in the wild most of the interesting kinds tuck themselves away in crevices. So at home, choose a sheltered spot to see them at their best.
Start by marking out the area. You can do it the traditional way by laying out the garden hose, or use a can of spray paint. Either way, you can easily make any alterations to the shape before you start digging.
Strip off any existing turf and clear weeds, taking good care to get rid of any deep-rooted perennial kinds that cause havoc in a rock feature later.
Fork the ground over as deeply as you can since you don’t want it trodden down hard – light and airy makes for better drainage.
Next build your walls round the edge – between 30cm and 46cm is all that’s needed to provide the good drainage alpines love. Once the walls are complete, start filling the hollow space in the centre.
If you have any rubble to get rid of, this is a grand way to get shot of it as it makes valuable coarse drainage material.
Spread a layer, 1½ to 2½cm deep, over the floor of the bed, but avoid adding garden rubbish and general junk as you don’t want to introduce perennial weeds.
Cover your layer of coarse drainage material with 5cm of gravel then fill the bed with a mixture of equal parts topsoil, well-rotted organic matter and gritty horticultural sand, or pea-sized shingle.
Topsoil and well-rotted organic matter should both be good quality and free from weed seeds or roots. If you aren’t sure of your supplies, it pays to buy bags of compost and peat-free potting mix to use instead. It’ll set you back a few bob, but you’ll never regret it when you see how much weeding it saves.
When the bed is full of your home-made alpine planting mixture, to within about 5cm of the top, choose a few goodlooking rocks to decorate it.
My advice is keep to the same kind throughout and be sure that it matches the paving and walls.
Then just add plants – that’s the fun part, which you will want to save for March or April when the weather is in planting mood. See the box opposite for suggestions.
Gone are the days of 50s-style rockeries filled with aubrieta