Planting Between Bricks

I finished the brick pathway through my garden last fall. (Thought Process in the Garden May 21^st blog) The winter rains kept washing away the sand between the stones. This will continue until the sand settles and some type of plants, hopefully not weeds, colonize the sand. I decided to help out the process.

I wandered the groundcover and Stepables area of the nursery for plants that will tolerate foot traffic and do well in sun/part shade. I came up with a number of different plants.

Corsican mint and Elfin thyme are very low growing plants that smell good when walked upon. Creeping speedwell will do well in part shade.

Red Leaf Sea Thrift and Old Gold Rockcress both grow about 2-4 tall. I put these in the edge bricks, not down the main walking path. Old Gold has a variegated leaf and will stand out for that reason. Sea Thrift has a really nice pink flower that stands about 6 tall; a little tall for stepping stone plants, but worth it for the color.

Pink Texas Scullcap (scutellaria suffrutescens) grows to 5 tall and would be good for the edges of the pathway as well as fragrant Alyssum.

Since I already put the path in, I now had to put the 4 plants between the stones. Not an easy job. Heres what I did.

I took the plants out of the pots and took off all the dirt. When the plant could be divided, like the

Corsican mint, I cut them into smaller chunks. I had to dig out the sand between the stones, carefully tuck each plant in and cover it with the sand. A chopstick or screwdriver helps to tuck the plants in between the stones. Water is going to be really important for these plants this summer, but luckily weve had lots of rain so far.

Where I had a larger root ball, I looked for larger gaps between my bricks. This worked for me since my brick pathway was very casually put in and some of the bricks had corners chipped off leaving larger gaps.

So far everything is thriving and starting to grow larger. This winter less sand will wash away!

Tags: bricks, step stones, stepables

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