PROPAGATING ROCK-GARDEN PLANTS
These are, of course, perennials and with slight variations can be propagated like other perennials. (See pages [255–59].)
Seeds
Some need a pre-germination cold and some don’t; some germinate best at cool temperatures, some at warm; some need light, others need dark. Check seed packet, catalogue, or reliable reference book for specific information for each type of seed.
We start seeds of delicate varieties in the greenhouse, where we can hover over them, in late winter; others may be sown in the cold frame in March or April, so the plants will be as mature as possible before their first winter.
Stem Cuttings
For the smaller plants, these can be as short as three inches or less. Try to take snappy new growth, neither weak and watery nor hard and tough. Sharp sand is a suitable rooting medium for many types.
CHAPTER 12
MINIATURE POOLS AND WATER PLANTS
If you can work out a way to use water in your landscape, by all means do. Whether it’s a dime-sized tub the birds dip into, or a full-scale formal pool in a tiled patio, any garden with water attracts immediate attention, gives quick pleasure, becomes an unquestionable center of interest. Actually, the excitement water adds to any landscape scene is the antithesis of its calm, cooling, serene effect. I don’t know of any other feature that, with a few plants and a minimum of care, makes a garden spot at once so dramatic, artistic, and restful. And if the water moves—ripples through a stream, drips over stones, falls from one level to another—soothing sound is added to the other assets.
Natural brooks, streams, and pools usually require little designing beyond bringing out the best of their inherent beauty. But there’s also not a suburban lot for which some kind of artificial water garden can’t be designed, and few grounds that are not thereby enhanced. The only requisite is that the design be in harmony and scale with its setting; that it be conceived, located, and constructed with imagination and skill.
The fact that pools are inevitably natural focal points makes their faults more obvious and more difficult to correct. The most you can do, once a pool is in the ground, is to soften or otherwise improve its outline with coping, rocks, or plants. If there’s too much cement, you can’t hide it with aquatic plants without covering, too, the desirable reflections on the water. If it’s too small, you can hardly make it larger. If the shape is uninteresting, you can’t change it very easily. If it’s in the wrong spot or faced the wrong way, you can’t move it.
On the other hand, the charm of water itself is so strong that it is comparatively easy to create a design that looks just right, particularly if simplicity is the keynote in both pool and planting. Simple shapes are safer and more effective than intricate ones; few plants, well placed, are better than many; water spraying from a concealed pipe is often more desirable than a formal fountain or statuary.
Depending on architecture and terrain, garden pools may be of formal design—a perfectly regular shape; semiformal—the shape balanced but not usually regular, often in severe contemporary style; or informal, completely asymmetrical, and integrated so naturally in the landscape the pool looks as if it has always been there. Each type of design can be executed in so many different ways that, even for tiny pools, there’s good reason to study photographs and articles in gardening and homemaking magazines. There’s also inspiration in the designs in books about water gardens, plus detailed information on various types of construction that I’ve had to omit. I’ve built miniature rock gardens but never a pool. Someone who fathoms the mysteries of water levels and understands the intricacies of cement work can give much more reliable advice than I.
Formal Design.
Small square, rectangular, circular, or oval pools can be extremely effective in almost any kind of landscape except one so rocky and untamed as ours. They’re usually best in level ground, and most harmonious with borders and other plantings of fairly formal pattern. And, of course, they’re constructed of materials that give a formal effect, such as concrete, tile, or brick.
A raised pool in the center of a small terrace, with a foot-high wall of tile or brick, can be scaled down from classic designs of other eras. A wide coping on the wall provides a place to set potted plants, or to seat yourself to feed the goldfish and dabble your fingers in the cool water.
A quadrant-shaped pool in the corner where garden walls meet can be either raised or level with the ground. Its water might reflect the image of a saint in a shrine above it, or might catch the constant stream from a lovely fountain.
At one end of a narrow garden a rectangular or oval pool becomes a striking focal point. A path may lead to a bench on a far side, between the pool and a background of shrubs.
At the end of a garden path a fountain may spout from a mortared wall into a projecting pool set at convenient dipping height from the ground, for filling watering cans. The planting underneath can be permanent, or an arrangement of potted plants.
And why not a tiny, formal pool in the center of a miniature rose garden? Or under a piece of traditional garden statuary? Or simply in the center of a garden path that splits to make room for it? If it’s of proper proportion, a formal pool can even be set in the center of a garden, sometimes even in the center of a small lawn area.
Semiformal Design
Here’s where the popular kidney-shaped pools are most useful. They’re neither formal nor informal, but especially attractive with contemporary architecture. Planting is usually sparse but dramatic, making extreme use of contrasting colors and textures, and of unusual lines. Construction materials are simple to keep them subordinate in interest to the over-all design.
A refreshing sight outside a picture window is a small pool recessed in the patio floor. A recirculating pump sends up a spray of water from a pipe that ends just below the surface of the pool. These pumps make it possible for fish and plants to coexist with fountains because they reuse water in the pool. Fresh water from a spring, a stream, or the pipes that supply the house is too cold; and it may lack the small organisms on which fish feed.
Pools of contemporary design can also be placed in a corner of the property, with a tasteful grouping of shrubbery behind; on the bottom level of a series of terraces; in a depressed spot in the lawn; in the curve of a path; or at one side of a breezeway. They can be illuminated dramatically with the new underwater lights available in many sizes and styles.
Informal, Naturalistic Design
These are either adaptations of existing streams or pools, or designs of uneven form deliberately created to look as if they had been there all the time. They’re best suited, of course, to naturalistic landscapes where slopes, rocks, and hidden springs give them a reason for existence. The water-holding basin may be of any material, as long as it is not noticeable. Any edgings, copings, or nearby trimmings should be just as natural as the pools.
A rock garden on a slope is a perfect setting for a pool with rocks that jut out over the water and, if possible, a rock or two coming up through the water from below. Or two small pools, one above the other, can be joined by a miniature waterfall. If there’s no water supply on the spot, use a recirculating pump. But be careful that the waterfall doesn’t resemble man-made steps. It should be as craftily haphazard as if the elements had worn it into the rocks.
A dripstone is another delightfully musical device—an overhanging rock from which water drips down onto the surface of the pool. The sound has more resonance when there is an empty chamber behind the dripping water.
A meandering brook can be widened to make a pool. Or a completely artificial brook can be constructed of cement, like a pool, with drainage and overflow pipes and similar appurtenances. This isn’t easy to execute effectively, but it can be completely intriguing. It might be wise to try to re-create part of a real stream in the nearby countryside.
One small boulder half-sunk in the ground can inspire an irregular, shallow pool that makes a natural birdbath. A miniature shrub may back up the boulder; rock-garden plants may grow at its base.
Many nooks and corners in the naturalistic landscape spontaneously suggest the creation of a tiny pool, and become exciting little garden surprises. These can often be so simply made that there’s not even a drainage hole in the bottom. Scooping out the water, as needed, is no chore at all.