Help with my yard full of rocks!

Ok I am not sure where to post this thread but here it goes, for now anyway...I know people pay thousands of dollars for the advice of professional landscapers, but I am going to try to get some almost free advice right here from all of you wonderful, knowledgeable people.
I am starting from scratch. My husband and I just bought a brand new house 2 months ago, and there is not a scrap of landscaping done. Exciting for me!! I am thrilled to be starting my own gardens and yard, though I am scared it will all to start to feel a little overwhelming. Right now my yard is nothing but rocks (we got all of the HUGE ones cleared out, but we are right by a river so there are plenty more medium and small ones left!!) , and we have quite a bit of free "topsoil", but it too, has some rocks, and I fear it is not very good quality. I am wondering what the best mix of topsoil would be for me to buy, to add in with the free stuff to make it into a better quality. I am planning a small vegetable garden, perrenial gardens x 4 or 5, shade gardens(for the front of the house) as well as trees such as corkscrew hazel, kousa dogwood, eastern redbud and of course A LAWN!! I know each of these areas will probably like a different mix of soil in each, so I just need to know what a very good general mix of topsoil should contain for my "base".
Also wondering if it would be ok to leave the majority of the rocks (except for the biggest) and just put my good mixture of topsoil to an approx. depth of 6-8 inches on top? Will this work? Or will the rocks underneath just eventually find their way back up to the surface?...Help! I am feeling overwhelmed already!!! I am not totally new to the gardening scene, but I am not nearly as knowledgable as some people I have met :) Please, any advice at all is most welcome!! I am very excited to get the chance to do my own landscaping and the plants themselves, I can handle, I just need some help with the first baby steps !! :-)
I will include a few pics just in case anyone is interested.......Thank You!

Lets try pic #2 ~This one is standing by the back of the house looking out at the yard..it does look smaller in the pictures than it actually is, but it is not huge..roughly 7000 sq ft.

And one more..and again any advice is MUCH appreciated :-)

i would(i do) use the rocks to outline your garden beds! I have a 100yr old rock pile that is huge-if you look in the shadow to the far left you can see the rock pile!
http://aoeu.davesgarden.com/forums/fp.php?pid=17471

good luck!!!

I can't help you much with your soil questions, but I do have some advice or rather suggestions for using those rocks.
We too had a great deal of rocks in and around our yard when we bought our house. We were getting sick and tired of moving them from one pile to another, so decided to do something with them.
I've spent the past 3 years building a wishing well, retaining wall, stairs, and bed borders with them.
Here is a picture collection of some of those projects.

Great ideas for the rocks Notmartha and RikerBear, I am actually planning to use them to border some beds and here and there throughout the yard..those are some great projects Riker. I'm just a little concerned what effect all that rock moving and piling and storing is going to have on my back!!! If I am going to save them, I have to pile them all before we lay the sod......

Ummmm, invest in a good back belt....or hire some young strong teenage boys. Half way through of the early projects my partner convinced me (as I lay in pain) to get a hot tub. :-)

Hahaha, actually we already have a hot tub coming, it will be here before the yard can even get started! Thank goodness I guess! Hmmm, hiring young men though...thats an idea ;-)

What a beautiful view, iluvmygarden! I moved from Boulder,CO recently to Granbury,TX. In Boulder you couldn't plant a pansy without digging up several rocks. Here I have sand and can dig and dig without finding a rock. Wish I had more because they can add so much interest to a garden. It's nice to nestle more tender plants near them because larger rocks can retain some of the heat from the sun.

Good luck with your new landscape!

With every freeze and thaw cycle, the rocks will migrate to the top. A neighbor when I lived on the farm had an attachment to his tractor that would go through the pasture and scoop up the rocks. We did that every year and the next year there would be another crop of rocks.

Good luck!

Thanks for the info about the rocks coming back up to the surface, I thought they would.
Sugarfoot, that sounds like moving from one gardening world to another, I think it would be wonderful to have so much sand. I'll trade ya some of my rocks for some of your sand.. LOL. We love the view, it's beautiful, we have a moutain view from every window, and on the clear days, there is nothing that beats the sight of that big mountain in the back.(Hope Mtn.) So you can see, I will need a stunning yard to compete with the view :-)
Thanks for the good luck wishes!

I just might take you up on that sand for rocks trade. We're hoping to take an Alaskan cruise out of Vancouver this summer. LOL I had beautiful views of the Rockies in Colorado and now look out an trees/river/hills beyond...both beautiful in their own way.

I love a view of any sort, especially rivers, it's always something to look at to pass the time...
Do you think there will be room on the cruise ship for 1/2 ton of rocks?...I check with the cruise line first ;-)

I would forget the lawn. Just pick-up the rocks, or move them aside, from where you would want pathways. Plant your flowers, herbs & veggies right among the rocks. I can visulise a very pretty natural looking area when it's all in filled out & in bloom.
I have been working here for 10 years trying to get what you got. I have an area about 50' x 100' now. I have to go find rocks to bring to my yard.
Another plus of the rocks, they tend to hold moisture around them so drought is less of a probelm.
As for rocks coming to the surface. Every time you do any tillage they will migrate to the top. They do not come to the top on their own. I grew up in Northern Minnesota. Lots of rocks, ground freezing down 4 to 6 feet every winter. We had a permanent pasture, big rocks sticking out all over, in my 31 years there they never got any farhter out of the ground.

By your pictures, it looks like your soil probably will grow great plants with out added soil. Just add compost & organic matter as time goes along. No need to try and do it all at one shot.

We need pictures after you get some flowers blooming!

Happy gardening,
Bernie

Small rocks (fist size or smalled) do indeed migrate to the surface over time. I pick up new ones every Spring here....I doubt boulder size do however :-)

Here's an idea. If you don't have a dog, get one. Then you'll have an excuse to outside late at night....to 'walk the dog'. How's this related to my rock problem you say? Well, when you're out 'walking the dog', grab 4 or 5 rocks and throw them into the neighbors yard. After a few months, you'll be rock-free :D LOL I just hope you have good neighbors though ;) (sorry, couldn't help it :) )

Glad your not my neighbor................ LOL

Actually, I take most of my rocks (mostly sort of flat limestone) and use them to stack around beds. I'm sort of shying away from this now though because the moles love to tunnel under them and the ants love that habitat too. The garter snakes like it as well, but I don't mind having them in my garden :)

Oh here's an example of what I did with them....

Beautiful HC!

Rikerbear, how did you build the retaining walls with rocks?

hczone6, luv your pic. What is the tall plant at the end....bamboo???

Iluvmygarden you can use the stones to outline your pond or gardens or like Rikerbear make neat things with them.
:) Donna

That's all grass. Closest in the photo is northern sea oats grass and the distant one is feather reed grass (karl foerster)

Thanks for letting me know. It's looks great.
:) Donna

I lined the wall area to be built on with chicken wire (used long U shaped pins made of coat hanger to secure them to the soil), than built up one row at a time mortaring the rocks into place as I went.
I added about three rows of rocks each day for over 2 months before it was finished.....could have done it faster if I had angled the wall back a bit more. Mine was more or less straight up and down so if I tried to go to high on any given day the rocks tended to slip out of place easily of collapse from the bottom most freshly mortared layer.
Did the same with the wishing well.....built a square structure out of preasure treated 2x4s lined it with heavey gauge wire sheeting, and did the rocks up layer by layer.....that project took over a year to build. It was built to hide and dispose of a big ole ugly tree stump....worked great :-)

Marc

Marc, thanks for the instructions. I would luv to start something like that on our property we bought for our retirement one day. We have 10 acres which is mostly treed but there are sections that have been cleared. There is alot of rocks down the road from us that we can get from the farmers.
:) Donna

Good for you Donna....it feels great when it's finished, and looks so rustic and wonderful. I really love the way ours turned out, and am sure I won't tire of it, as I did with the origonal timber wall I put in 12 years ago....boring boring boring :-)
Good luck!

I think Countrygardens idea is great!! I have saw yards like this and they are gorgeous.
We have 2-3 acres of lawn to cut each week and I hate it. My dream is to eventually cover my yard in plants- and rocks.

Thanks for all the ideas! I especially love the one about "giving" the rocks to the neighbors late at night, and I am getting my puppy this weekend lol..;-)

The idea of keeping all of the rocks is growing on me for sure, but I just have to have some lawn. I love to mow, I love the smell, the feel...yes, I must have some lawn at least. I once lived in a house with no grass in the yard, just gravel and cement and rocks, and I have to tell you, that place was the motherload for ants! BIG ones too!!! The kind that go "CRUNCH" under your feet....(((shiver)))
Now I'm just thinking of lining pathways and beds with the rocks , and I love the tree stump well project of Rikers..I guess I should just take my time and enjoy it, even if the projects do take awhile.
I will certainly post pics once I get it on the go, I can't wait to see it myself !

We lived in glacial moraine country for 25 years and I thought I never wanted to see a rock again. Now we live in the flatlands and I would have to pay a fortune to get a few like the ones I was always digging up. The sizes ranged from the size of a Volkswagen down to sand and everything in between. I built almost 1,000 running feet of retaining walls and terraces out of what worked it's way to the surface and broke an average of a shovel a summer. At least I learned how to build dry walls and actually took pride in them. Jessamine

I'm jealous....if I want rocks I have to buy them. Before we moved to the Northwest part of Missouri my husband and I lived in Southwest Missouri (the Ozarks) lots of rocks. I have thought of calling a trucker to see what it would cost to have a load of rocks brought in...just afraid to take the first step for fear of cost.

Anyway...enjoy your rocks. :) Deb

Actually, I don't think it's TOO bad to get a truckload of rocks dropped in your yard, a few hundred dollars, which, yes, will set you back a bit, but if you want them bad enough...
I am starting to feel bad now, everybody wants my rocks, and I just wish I didn't have so many of them.My husband would be shocked that I want rid of them, seeing as every single camping trip we go on, every 4x4 trip, I bring "nice" rocks home. He's forever telling me "thats enough rocks!" I even have my son into it too...I brought rocks all the way back from Moab, Utah, and Twin Falls, Idahoe..so I guess maybe I should just enjoy the rocks that I have and try to remember the less fortunate, LOL, who would love to have them.. :)

You can put the small ones in the bottom of pots for drainage. I went from a rock filled yard to a rockless one and I actually miss them! I had some huge ones before and I was going to fashion a water feature but never got to.

Oh, the throwing the rocks in your neighbors yard idea? Well, one of my neighbors did that but in the field in front of his house. The farmer that owned the field saw him doing it and picked them all back up and threw them back! LOL!! I am extra careful to make friends with that farmer - gatorade on hot days while he's getting hay, etc.

Nicole

Edited to say: Rikerbear I LOVE your yard!!! It's looks just like I expected!

This message was edited Feb 3, 2005 3:20 PM

Oh your so sweet Nicole. Thanks for the compliment. :-)

Marc