Framing Rock Plant Seedlings
If you happen to have a cold frame available, that may be used; but it is better to make a frame especially for your rock plant seedlings. If this is constructed against a fence or a wall, three feet will be a convenient width, as all the reaching will have to be done from one side.
A half sash or “pony” frame, with sash three by three feet to fit it, may be purchased complete; or both frame and sash may be home-made. The former is easily constructed with one-inch boards, held in place by light posts. The latter may be light wooden frames, covered with plant-protecting cloth, or cello glass, which is light, convenient to use, not brittle, and perfectly suitable for keeping out storms and keeping in moisture.
If the sash are hinged at the back, to fasten up with a hook out of the way when not wanted, it will be found a great convenience. The frame commonly used for starting these types of plants is of the standard six-foot width, but facing or sloping to the north, instead of south, so as not to catch but to deflect, the sun’s rays.
In addition to the glass sash or cello glass sash, for keeping out stormy weather, there will be needed also some form of shading, which is quite as necessary as the other. Light wooden frames, of a size which will just cover either one or two of the glass sash, may easily be made from one by two inch strips, and covered with ordinary plastering lath spaced their own width apart. Or, consider garden statuary (http://www.garden-fountains.com/Detail.bok?no=2919) that can provide shade as well as decoration.
Soil
Perfect drainage is just as essential in the frames as in the rock garden itself. Dig out six or eight inches of soil, and fill in with a six-inch layer of gravel or cinders; fill in over this with a mixture of one-third each of sand, granulated peatmoss, and light garden loam. Then top off with two inches, one-half sand and one-half peatmoss, screened to make it loose and fine. For lime-loving varieties, agricultural lime, at the rate of a quart or two to the bushel, may be added.
Sowing the Seed
The seeds of many of the rock plants in nature remain in the ground over winter, and start, almost under the melting snows, in the spring. They may be planted, therefore, in the autumn (late October or November), covered with leaves, and left until March, when the bedding is removed in time for them to get up.
Others should be planted just as early in the spring as possible; so as to allow a full growing season before their first winter; for they must be firmly anchored by their long roots to prevent “heaving out” in climates where there is danger of alternate freezing and thawing
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