All rocks and no soil, a gardening challenge!

Category: gardening among the rocks | Posted: Sun Aug 27, 2006 5:07 am

My gardening challenge is simple but enormous. I live on a rocky prairie. On land that, when my grandparents came out West, made them roll their eyes and keep on moving to found a town on more friendly soil. Seriously! The ground here holds onto marks made in it for a looong time, and running through what is now my goat pasture are a set of ruts that were probably made by a horse drawn wagon!
Anyways, that part of my place I maintain in wildflowers. I have to mow the whole thing 2 or 3 times a year to keep the nonnative brush down, but as long as my riding mower holds out, it isn't too bad. And if the weather would go back to my old familiar mild-and-rainy, the wildflowers will go on doing well. I have everything from meadowlarks to california quail, wild bunnies to porcupines visiting my bit of prairie, and I love it. But, to create a green fire break near my house, and to continue developing my Pseudo-Japanese garden near the evergreens, is a really huge challenge. If I plant a tree, and at the same time a friend with decent soil plants a tree, within a very short time the difference is obvious. A crabapple I planted here 15 years ago is far more spindly and scraggly than I would like!
So, I raise bunnies. Not only because, well, I adore bunnies, but also because they produce a nice fertilizer. I let it pile up & compost for a while, then spread it around the garden. So I'm gradually getting a bit of actual soil going. But I still have a long way to go.
I plant my veggies in raised beds. My sweetie built these almost 15 years ago, and they are rotting slowly despite being cedar. Gonna have to work on that. They have landscape fabric under them to keep the soil from washing away.
Whew, that's enough for one night. Hope it rains soon, the wildfires around here are getting scary!

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Gardenstew wrote on Sun Aug 27, 2006 9:57 am:

Great to see you started a blog CritterPainter we really enjoy reading about adventures and projects in other member's gardens.

I hope you get rain soon as from the similar distress of several members I realise it has gone beyond a joke at this stage. We'll do a rain dance for you, maybe that will help.

We'd love to help answer questions for you and help you out whatever way we can. Some photos would really help as well.

Ok after writing that, I'm off for some breakfast ;)

muddybob wrote on Sun Aug 27, 2006 1:54 pm:

Hello and welcome!
It sounds as if you are east of the Cascades. Where are you located? Hope it's ok to ask.
What breed of goats do you raise? Are you an artist that paints animals? If so we'd like to see your worksome time!

muddy

eileen wrote on Mon Aug 28, 2006 12:23 am:

Hi there CritterPainter I just dropped in to welcome you to the Stew and to say that I really do hope you get some decent rain soon.

Your patch of wildflower prairie sounds great and we would love to see pictures of it.

I'd also love to see some of your paintings please.

CritterPainter wrote on Mon Aug 28, 2006 2:11 am:

LOL, people always want to see pics and I'm not very good at wrangling pictures into my computer! I'm working on it, though, with the help of my techie husband! I'm on the western side of things, ever hear of the Mima Mounds? Yep, out there!

Gardenstew wrote on Mon Aug 28, 2006 10:28 am:

Critter you can learn how to post photos here http://www.gardenstew.com/about333.html

jubabe296 wrote on Mon Aug 28, 2006 8:29 pm:

Hello Critterpainter!! Welcome to the Stew. I enjoyed reading your entry and I look forward to reading alot more!! I adore bunnies and goats also so your blog is already very interesting to me!!lol!