Troughs

[ranunculus]

Cliff could you not have put the smaller trough inside the larger? And I would suggest Sue would have been happy to carry the camera.

Carry my camera, Lesley?   Are you COMPLETELY insane?  Do you know how precious that is?  I did try carrying the two troughs like churns on a yoke, but then (as always, boom, boom) ... the yoke was on me!!!!!

[Roma]

Spotted this one outside the public toilets in Dumfries.  It was quite near the bus stop but the bus driver refused to take it 
The inscription isn't easy to read but I think it says 'A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast'

[angie]

Spotted this one outside the public toilets in Dumfries.  It was quite near the bus stop but the bus driver refused to take it 
The inscription isn't easy to read but I think it says 'A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast'

Roma these bus drivers aren't very helpful nowadays  , would have been nice in front of your living room window

Angie 

[kindredspiritkevin]

Spotted this one outside the public toilets in Dumfries.  It was quite near the bus stop but the bus driver refused to take it 

Silly Billy! You should have tied it onto the back bumper of the bus! 

[Lesley Cox]

Carry my camera, Lesley?   Are you COMPLETELY insane?  Do you know how precious that is?  I did try carrying the two troughs like churns on a yoke, but then (as always, boom, boom) ... the yoke was on me!!!!!

You win!

[Lesley Cox]

Silly Billy! You should have tied it onto the back bumper of the bus! 

Perhaps we should all carry a set of wheels to have available for such opportunities. The trough could easily have been slid onto the wheelbase and towed along. No problem.

[Lesley Cox]

My mind is being exercised somewhat about how to transport my troughs to our new home. I don't intend to take them all - there are close to 100 -  but certainly those from Hokonui Alpines, currently planted as crevice gardens, all the limestone ones and the best of our own hypertufa, maybe 20. Then there are 17 concrete calf drinking-troughs which usually have gravel on the bottom and contain seed pots, and 4 double concrete washtubs. I think all will have to be emptied, even to dislodge them let alone load them onto something - a flat deck truck I suppose - and transport them. Total perhaps 50! and all extremely heavy even empty.

[astragalus]

Lesley, the troughs that last the longest here are the concrete ones.  The hypertufa troughs last maybe ten years before they start to crumble.  The pictures are first of a disintegrating hypertufa trough with fabulous plants.  I moved it and cracked a corner.  This was repaired with a stone that looks like a wolf's head but now the side is starting to crumble.  The last two pictures are of a cement trough which has lasted quite well and was made by Michael Peden in upstate New York.

[Jiri Papousek]

Trough from 1856 in French village, it proves that my troughs will survive me    Few examples from garden combining 3 smaller troughs.

[DaveM]

Brilliant Jiri!! Yes, the troughs will survive all of us. I must congratulate you on the rock work displayed in your pictures. As a field geologist of many years I often find that many crevice gardens do not work for me. But your rock work obeys all the rules of bed thickness with good imitation of jointing to give a pleasing effect. Crevice garden constructors should take inspiration from your work - picture 2 is particularly instructive. I also like the way you have intersected the troughs. The current harshness of the landscape will be nicely softened once the plants get well established. Hope you will share some pictures in a year or so time when the planting has established.

[Jiri Papousek]

Thank you Dave  , this picture shows how troughs are connected with other crevices.  Garden will be displayed next year during Garden tour after 2nd Czech International Conference, what about to come and check our crevices?

[Maggi Young]

Cliff Booker passed on this link to a TV piece from Wisconsin, of Ed Glover a NARGS and SRGC member, demonstrating the SRGC Fish box trough method to gardening show host Shelly Ryan.
There is a video here:

http://wpt.org/gardener/transcript.cfm?id=553

 Ed has the SRGC method to a "T"  though He does calls us the SRGS - which is a common hiccup!

The only difference with his demo of the troughs and ours is that he advised brushing the contrast paint spots, rather than stippling them, which we have found gives the best looking "stone" result.
Such fun that the fishbox trough is making itself so well known across the pond. - I think the Minnesotans and Albertans were among the first there to promote it in the early 2000s. 

[kindredspiritkevin]

Got permission off a farmer to quarry some weathered limestone in some of his fields.
Put some of the rock into a trough the other day and this is the result.
Plants are;
5 Saxifrages,
Potentilla Nitida Rubra,
Erysimum Amoenium,
Helichrysum Pagophilum,
Asyneuma Pulvinatum,
Antennaria Dioica Minima,
Anchusa Cespitosa,
& Petunia Patagonica.

Apologies. You'll have to scroll across the picture.

[Maggi Young]

Very nice, Kevin- a trough "built-up" like that is  the creme de la creme!

[kindredspiritkevin]

Thanks, Maggie. I'm not a flower person: I'm more into form, structure and shape. Although, I love Saxifrages when they burst forth in the Spring.

It's hard to find weathered rock, though.