In this region, especially Kanata and the Gatineau Hills, rock outcrops or stony soil are ideally suited to perennials found in mountainous regions.

In nature, plants adapt to a myriad of conditions. In mountains, weather (i.e. freezing and thawing) creates gravel beds with minimal humus content. Many alpine perennials grow very successfully in these lean conditions. These alpine plants (many found above the tree line) tolerate hot, sunny, often windy, and dry conditions. In deserts, other plants tolerate blazing sun and daily temperature extremes and survive by growing in the shade of rocks, developing long tap roots, and developing ways of reducing moisture loss. Plants found in alpine or desert areas, where moisture conservation is important for a plant’s survival, often have fuzzy looking or waxy leaves.

In the home garden, we can take advantage of plants adapted to mountainous or desert areas. One option is to build a specialty rock garden containing gritty soil. Give your new garden a 3"- 5" bed of gravel to ensure exceptional winter and spring drainage. In any sunny garden (and some shade gardens) it is possible to make pockets of soil using a gritty soil. In this case, create a raised planting area to establish exceptionally good drainage – many alpines suffer in soggy conditions. Also be creative and place pots or other unique containers throughout the garden to accommodate your alpine plants’ special soil needs. Many alpine plants don't like their stems to be in contact with wet soil – these should have a 1/2 inch deep surface mulch of pea-size gravel placed around the plant to keep the stems dry.

Some alpine plants are fussy about the acidity of the water and soil that they are given. A pH of about 5.5 to 6.5 would be the target for acid-loving plants. In the Ottawa area our underlying rock formations (and by extension our water characteristics) are not acidic enough for some alpine plants. Many of us have water in the pH range of 7.0 to 8.0 – the acid-loving alpines will not survive many years of these unmodified conditions. If you are not going to pay attention to maintaining acidic conditions of plants with these requirements, select plants suited to this region’s naturally alkaline conditions.

Rapidly draining soils constructed as above need added fertilizers to meet the needs of growing plants. A weekly feeding of water-soluble fertilizer (15:30:15 or 7:14:7) at 1/4 recommended strength should be adequate.

Alpines in the Open Garden. 1991. Elliott, Jack. Timber Press. Portland, Oregon. 137 p.

Alpines: The Illustrated Dictionary. 1995. Innes, Clive. Timber Press. Portland, Oregon. 192 p.

Miniature Gardens. Carl, Joachim. 1990. Timber Press, Inc. Portland, Oregon.159 p. (This book is especially good due to the focus on the soil needs of individual varieties of alpines.)

Rock Gardening. 1982. Foster, H. Lincoln and Laura Louise Foster. Timber Press. Portland, Oregon. 466 p.