Rockery by Dog Kennel

The rockery by the old dog kennel was one of my early attempted artistic gardening efforts. The kennel itself is an heirloom, and the small pseudo-rockery next to it actually had some conifers planted amongst the craggy rocks. Note the use of 'pseudo'...

Compulsory Conifers

I'm not very good with conifers, so to encourage me the web-master would send birthday money to purchase compulsory conifer plants. I tried to choose really blobby shaped ones. But slow growing, please!

 Check out the cute conifers.
The Rockery - Summer 2007

I tried to create the rockery in the year 2005. But I planted grasses (and other bits and pieces) rather than buying in alpines and more traditional rockery plants. Oops... That did prove to be a little short-sighted.

 Ha! Here is the very first photograph.
The Very First Moosey Rockery - 2005

Proper rocks...

I moved in plants like tussock grasses and carexes which had seeded in other areas of the garden, and which I knew would grow quickly. The rocks were proper rocks, though - not those odd plastic look-alikes that I'd seen advertised in magazines.

 Ha! There are some rocks visible...
Rock and Conifer

Famous rockeries that I've visited (for example, the sloping rockery at Mount Tomah Botanic Gardens in Australia) cannot compare to this - my very first original Moosey rockery. I'll not elaborate!

Update

OK. So planting 'grasses and other bits and pieces' might not have been the best idea. Anyone with half a gardening brain could have foreseen what would happen to this rockery!

Where exactly are the rocks? Could one be lurking, submerged underneath that huge Hebe? Is another perhaps underneath that man-sized Phormium? Oh dear, dear, dear me. I didn't realise that rocks were so shy...

Not a Proper Rockery

So this wasn't exactly a proper rockery, with cute little cushion plants. But neither was it a proper dog kennel, though dear old Taj-Dog spent some of his first Moosey days inside it.

 There are lots of self-seeded Angelicas in here now. Oops.
The Rockery and Dog Kennel

Over the years I did try to prune out the giants. And I added more cute conifers - their labels said they were suitable. It's been a fun garden but a failed rockery. Those little specialist plants would have been a better idea.

 Huge Phormiums and Hebes, and no conifers!
The Dog Kennel Garden - 2017