Re: making troughs

In a message dated 6/23/02 8:02:16 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
cherylisaak@adelphia.net writes:

<< Has anyone made a trough garden? starting with the trough?  I've 
 played with the idea for a while now; I want one to show off my 
 smallest sedums! >>


This is a vast subject with recipes and advice galore.  It is also one where 
children can participate. My now 10 year old grandson had a wonderful time 
with grandpa and trough making.  They spend several sessions and turned out a 
bunch for me that I very proud to own.

I can copy some material and send it off for you or you can find quite a lot 
including illustrations on search.  It is basically making mudpies for adults 
and coming up with some containers that have a very natural look for plants 
that do not fit into garden borders or beds.

One of the misnomers on troughs is that the peat in the mix allows alpine 
plants to send roots into the walls of the troughs imitating true rocky 
conditions.  This really does not happen, the end product is concrete and 
that is that.  You can add spaghnum to the surfaces or pebbles or what you 
like and make natural looking planters that are very popular just now.  You 
can also buy them all over New England for huge prices.  At the spring Boston 
show, I saw some truly creative troughs.

You need to assemble materials, forms or shapes, mixing equipment and have a 
day to make a really big mess.  Note, it is a really big mess.  The AGS 
(Alpine Garden Society) site has a set of pictures from beginning to end.

Then you put them into a shady place and wet them down for a a few weeks 
while they cure.  After this is all done you have troughs to place on stones, 
place in gardens where plants are basiclly quite small or many other 
locations as your creativity dictates.  Sedums do very well and a mix of 
several kinds with rosularia or semps is permanent and easy to care for.  

I have a bunch of them due to the assembly line of grandpa and grandson and I 
have been very happy to design gardens in all of them.

In the north, we cannot expect hardy plants to live over in troughs.  They 
need to be protected in winter so the size and weight are something to 
consider.   They do survive winter conditions but the plants do not unless 
connected to soil and covered with boughs or hay or something as a winter 
mulch.  

I prefer to replant most of mine each year as moving them is too much for us, 
they are very heavy.  We have some smaller ones that we are able to protect 
so you can think about size.

I had a florist here this week, bring me some flowers sent because of a death 
close to me and she asked to stop back on the end of her route.  She did and 
I enjoyed walking around with her.  She suggested the "Garden Open Today" 
signs and actually has some for sale.

Has anyone done this?  That is put up a sign at the end of your drive on days 
when working in the garden and willing to welcome local gardeners passing by. 
   This maybe be lovely idea when you feel like showing off, what could be 
wrong with it?

Claire Peplowski
NYS z4

---------------------------------------------------------------------
To sign-off this list, send email to majordomo@hort.net with the
message text UNSUBSCRIBE PERENNIALS
Other Mailing lists | Author Index | Date Index | Subject Index | Thread Index