Aubretia in dry stone wall
pottering girl
Posts: 223
in Plants
I have had a dry stone wall built and I got the builder to cement in some plastic plant pots along the top so that I could plant some aubretia. I bought aubretia plugs and have overwintered them in my greenhouse and they are looking nice healthy plants. I intend to plant out when it warms up a bit into the pots. I have started to think that maybe the pots aren't right as the roots won't spread even though I was advised to do this by a friend. Will they grow ok, perhaps the roots will spill out of the small pots into the wall, is that the idea?
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If it is a 'proper' dry stone wall the centre should be a pile of small rubble where potentially the roots could grow to. If they were not in plastic pots that is. If you take the plastic pots out, is there any drainage in the resulting hole or have you got a hole for the pot in a lump of concrete??
How big are the pots out of interest?
I have Aubretia growing and spreading in my dry stone wall. I usually tease out a few roots,and with a couple of handfuls of compost,stuff them back into odd pockets in the wall,they always take. I'm now going to try it with Arabis,and get some blues,purples and whites going. These kind of walls are such an asset in any garden I feel.
I will have to have a look. It is a proper dry stone wall with gravel in the centre of the wall layers if you see what I mean. The top though has cock and hen stones cemented in and the pots sit between some of these stones and have drainage holes and they have cement around the outside. I have a feeling that the builder set the bottom in concrete - hence my worry. With the top cemented for the cock and hen stones I can't see how (from the top) the roots can get to the gravel. The pots are small 3/4 inch.
cagzo, ok, sounds like I should go ahead and try to tease roots out into cracks between the stones as the plant starts to grow out of the pot. The wall is cotswold stone and very long and sits under a hawthorn/ivy hedge. I couldn't mow the lawn next to the hedge and it was really quite ugly at the bottom of the hedge so decided to have the wall built and it is a really nice feature at about 3/4 ft tall. I loved to see the old craft as well.
It doesn't sound as though the pots at the top are ideal. I would split your plants into little rooted bits, make a ball of moist soil round the roots, then cram them into the crevices on the face of the wall. I think you may have a better chance with that. Or you could try both if you have enough plugs.
I don't have much luck with aubretia except in a dry, north facing bed, where it thrives. Loves the parsley pot too.
hogweed thanks. Yes I have enough plants to put in pots and scatter some in some holes in the wall so will cover all bases.
They usually do well on a dry stone wall they were almost made for them.
I have resorted to putting them in pots in my garden. They never did well straight in the soil. I should probably make the compost in the pots a bit more rocky.
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