When I was a kid, I lived out in a rural community and we only had clay sod once you dug about 6 or 12 inches down. When you are planning your garden, you have got to put natural light and earth quality at the top of the list of things to consider. Without the right amounts of both light and water, your garden won’t prosper. With the right combination of water, soil and sunshine, you can grow just about anything.

To solve my clay earth problems, I turned to rock gardening, which focuses on adding lots of rocks to your landscape and focusing on plants that only need a few inches of good sod.

If you’ve got a similar situation, you can grow your own rock garden. Some herb plants truly love the rocky craggy sod that you have in areas like this all over the world. With excellent drainage, adequate natural light and all the nooks and crannies around the rocks where roots can dig in, rock gardens may be just the thing for you to try your hand at.

When planning your herb garden, be sure that you are choosing plants that can stay compact, because with limited room you do not want anything taking over. Another tip is to seek out herbs with silver or gray foliage. This is a big tip-off that these herbs will do well in this environment.

• Hen-and-Chicks: {I can’t imagine cutting open a hen or chick and rubbing it on a wart, but this perennial succulent herb, which is also known as St. Patrick’s cabbage, has a long history of doing just that.} The leaves of this herb store water for periods of drought. Your hen can get up to four inches across before you know it. Soon little off-shoots, or chicks, can sprout up from the edges of your hen. You will enjoy the reddish-pink blooms that can appear atop a nine inch spike that shoots straight up from the center of each hen in the summer. Before you know it, you will have a colony of hens-and chicks.

• Wild Oregano: This perennial from the Mediterranean region will grow energetically up to 30 inches tall with its oval leaves and purple blossoms that come out late in the summer. This isn’t the same variety of oregano that you find in Italian dishes, but you can eat it.

• Marjoram: You can cook with marjoram, but you can use it to landscape your rock garden. It is a perennial that has a delicate scent with oval gray-green leaves and tiny white flowers. Keep it cut back so that it will stay nice and full and don’t forget that it appreciates full sun and good drainage.

• Thyme: The shiny, little leaves of the thyme plant are clustered along woody stems that are adorned with numerous white or pink flowers and grows to a height of up to 12 inches. Thyme grows best when the sod is sandy, well-drained and gets a whole lot of sunlight. Thyme has a tendency to grow like crazy, so keep it snipped back to maintain its compact shape.

The contrast between the rocks and the herbs can amaze the eyes, without losing any of the other sensations, including smell and flavor.

Good luck with your herb gardening. Be sure to let me know how your herb garden grows.

Here is more information on Herb Garden Designs. Here is a website with a free mini-course dedicated to Herb Gardens.

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