8 replies to this topic

[koiguy1969]

I saw these videos and thought they may help people select plants for around the pond this way you can see them around an actual pond...
hope this helps some of our ponders to select some plants


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[oldmarine]

Hi koiguy,

I always look forward to your input. Thanks for the vidios of plants. There are some excelent ideas there.

I have mostly Irish moss and wooley thyme around my pond. What made me lean toward the moss and thyme is my dog was drinking out of the pond and kicking dirt into the pond. If need be the moss and thyme can be walked on and creates a nice neat mulicolored carpet around the pond.

[Airic]

Looks like good plants if you live in Florida. Wish they would list zone ratings when identifing the plant.

[koikeepr]

That shouldn't stop you Airic. You can buy plants and then overwinter 'em indoors; or you can buy small ones (like at home depot and lowes) and then just consider them annuals.

[koiguy1969]

Besides if you see something you like look them up online to see if you can use them or ask about them at your local pond supply. I saw some on the videos i will be inquiring about come spring.

[Airic]

I'm one of those picky gardeners but, is one of my hobbies. Hate anuals other than wild flowers cause I like to see a plant evolve over the years and I just don't have the green touch when I bring plants indoors cause they always die on me.

My top favorite is the Saxafragas but, I can only grow a few types here in the midwest. When living in Seattle I had a large collection and you could even find them in the wild near the rivers and streams around rocks. Highly recommend these if you live in a zone 7-8.

[oldmarine]

Hi Airic,

I moved back to Tacoma, WA in 1981. Since then I have collected some of the local wild annuals and planted them in a flower bed on the shadey side of our mother-in-law cottage not far from my pond. I also have a good variety of native ferns that only grow in complete shade.

Around my pond I chose to plant a carpet of irish moss and wooley thyme to hide the edges of the plack plastic pond. The combination of the two looks good and filled in rather quickly.

[Airic]

I miss my Seattle gardening as I did a lot of the same as you. One of my friends owned a nursery and he had government rights to go into selected forests to harvest different types of evergreens and he made a fortune off some of those trees.

Irish moss was one of my favorites as well but it does not do as well here in Indiana. Baby Tears, and Blue Star Creeper are also really good low ground covers for that area.

If you have not already you need to make a weekend trip to Flower World or Multbie Nursery. They are both some of the coolest nurseries around and have everything.

[oldmarine]

Hi Airic,

Thank you for the information. I will check the nurseries out.

Something that I noticed about the difference between irish moss and wooley thyme is, wooley thyme seems to be slower growing, but it is much hardier to hot and cold that the irish moss.

We had a few days this last summer that were just over 100 degrees F, and one samll area of irish moss that was still wet from a early morning watering turned brown and died from the direct heat of the sun.