How to Fix Rocky Soil with Permaculture

What do you do if you have rocky soil, but you want to grow a garden? Do you just give up? Build raised beds? Grow in pots? Is there a way to rehabilitate soil full of rocks?! Here’s how to fix rocky soil with simple permaculture principles applied on the homestead. We’ve included what you can do and make with rocks, as well. Since you have them, may as well use them!

What to Do with a Backyard Full of Rocks?

For any gardener who’s ever tried to grow a garden in rocky soil, we know that rocks can be a pain in the butt! Or the hands. Or the feet.

Some of us live on homesteads where one might think that our main crop is rocks for how many of them seem to be around the land and in the dirt.

There’s a phrase in permaculture circles that goes something like this:

The Problem is the Solution.

Or is it…

One Man’s Junk is Another Man’s Treasure.

Either way, as difficult as dealing with rocky soil can initially be, there are a lot of uses for rocks of various grades. What you initially thought of as a waste product, may turn out to be a really useful homestead and garden tool!

The truth about permaculture is that the principles are all based on common sense and a lot of observation of how nature works. On the homestead, we simply apply all that common sense and try to mimic what nature does so easily.

One thing nature does with ease is produce rocks! Since they’re so abundant, maybe we should learn to appreciate them and use them?

If you’d like some extra help improving your soil and you’d like to get started right now, get your free copy of our soil workbook by joining our newsletter family.

How to Get Rid of Rocky Soil?

Instead of getting rid of rocky soil, we might better ask the question:

How do we amend or improve rocky soil to that we can grow more food?

And how do we make use of rocky soil?

This article will cover the various ways we can amend rocky soil to make it productive and abundant. There are several methods we can employ and we’ll cover three different ways to rehabilitate or otherwise work with rocky soil.

Then, we’ll talk about the various things you can do with rocks on the homestead and how to make use of them.

Can You Amend Rocky Soil?

Yes, I assure you there are several ways to amend rocky soil! When we initially see that rocky expanse of dirt stretching out in front of us, we might be tempted to despair that we’ll never be able to grow anything.

However, with a little time and patience you can slowly amend the soil around the rocks to loose it and build its fertility. Some small rocks will always be beneficial for drainage in garden soil, but the larger rocks can be removed as you have time.

To make the soil loose, moist, and fertile, all you need is some “garden junk”. The following waste products can be used to heal your rocky soil.

Layer the following on top of your soil and keep it as deep as you can (6″ -12″) over an entire year with the largest materials on the bottom:

Pruned branches, vines, and bush trimmings.
Bark, shredded or larger pieces.
Leaves, shredded are best.
Straw – wheat, pine, whatever.
Cover crops like buckwheat and clover.
Native grasses and weeds before they go to seed.
Sawdust – be judicious with this and don’t let it compact to heavily.
Compost.

Try a Hugelkultur Bed Made of That Garden Junk

A hugelkultur, or hugel, bed is a mounded garden bed that is built in layers of garden waste material.

At the bottom is a layer of cardboard and then logs that become the base of the bed. This thick wood takes a long time to decompose and, as it does, it keeps the bed moist and full of nutrients.
On top of that is layer various organic materials like our previous list 1-8.
The very top layer is soil into which is planted various kinds of plants. These huglekultur beds are designed to decompose slowly over time, which requires that they be recharged with new organic materials to continue.

Or you can move the hugel bed to a new location and use the rehabilitated rocky soil underneath. You easily remove large rocks now and use the smaller ones for drainage.

It will be much easier to dig into this soil after these organic materials have spent 1-3 years resting on top of it. The soil will not only be fertile, but it will also be teeming with worms and microbial life perfect for growing food.

Here are three different articles detailing how to build a hugel bed:

How to Set Up a Hugelkultur Garden Bed, by Homestead or Dead

Hugelkultur Garden Beds, by Homestead in the Holler

An Improved Hugelkultur Bed, by Joybilee Farm

Best Plants for (Dry) Rocky Soil

Not all rocky soil is dry, of course, but sometimes rocks and dryness go hand in hand since rocky soil drains well.

The best plants for healing any kind of soil over the long haul are perennial plants. Perennial plants are those that come back year after year.

(As opposed to annual plants which begin and complete their life cycle in a growing season.)

Perennial plants have extensive root systems that give strength the soil, especially over time as they grow.

A Sampling of Perennials for Rocky Soils

Here are some useful homestead permaculture perennial plants that you might consider for your rocky soil rehabilitation:

Bugleweed (Ajuga)
Catmint or any Nepeta variety*
Coneflower (Echinacea)
Lavender
Milkweed
Native Grasses
Potentilla, any variety
Sedum
Shasta Daisy
Rosemary
Rudbeckia (Black Eyed Susan, etc.)
Sage
Thyme

*You’ll notice that many of these plants do double duty as useful herb plants and/or will attract pollinators to your gardens.

Useful Shrubs & Trees

Elderberry
False Indigo (Baptisia)
Dogwood
Hazelnut
Hawthorne
Holly
Ninebark (Physocarpus)
Rugosa Roses
Snowball bush or other hydrangea

The Best Perennials for Rocky Soils

The best perennials will always be those that are native to your area, especially as you’re first beginning to rehabilitate your rocky soil. Native plants are simply hardier and stronger than others.

They’re naturally adapted to your growing zone and will be able to thrive without much interference from you apart from good layers of mulch and some water now and then.

To learn more about plants native to your area, be sure to consult your local botanical garden and/or conservation department for your state (in the U.S.).
Your local permaculture group/school, as well as your local agricultural college or master gardener program should also be able to help you locate native species and plant sales in your area.

Groundcover Plants to Amend Rocky Soil

In any garden design created to rehabilitate rocky soil, don’t forget to add groundcover plants. One of the problems with rocky soil is that is has typically been exposed to weather and wind.

This exposure has slowly whittled away the organic matter until all we’re left with is clay that glues rocks together like a weird mosaic that repels the point of a shovel.

Rocky soil is exposed, naked and embarrassed, just waiting for you to come along and cover it with some armor.

All those natural materials we listed above act like a kind of armor for your soil and they’re absolutely vital to our success. However, plants can do just as much good in the long run.

After you’ve planted perennials and even annuals to begin to heal your dirt, finish off the planting with groundcover plants to add a final layer of protection.

Groundcover Plants:

Shade the soil from the hot summer sun.
Prevent soil erosion by covering the dirt with their leaves and flowers.
Slow down the transpiration of water from the soil to the air.
Release carbon into the soil.
Keep the soil temperature more even, preventing large spikes and dips that can cause damage to the soil life below the surface.

If you’re new to using these low-growing marvels on the homestead, our article Groundcover Plants for Pollinators can get you started.

Growing in Rocky Soil

If you have truly rocky soil, it’s quite possible that the best solution for growing an annual vegetable garden is to build raised garden beds.

Mounded garden beds, swales, and keyhole garden beds can also work nicely.

To prevent erosion of garden beds that are flat on the soil, include ground cover plants in and among the veggies. The more plants you can include in your vegetable garden, the better! This will keep the soil anchored and moist.
To learn to plant with companion plants, or guild planting in permaculture parlance, please visit the following article: Create a Vegetable Plant Guild in 7 Steps

Swales, Mandalas, Oh My!

Swales are garden beds dug to follow the contour of the land to direct water into the growing mound and sequester it there. You can think of it as planting water in the garden!

Swales work wonderfully well on a grade of less than 45 degrees, FYI. Anything steeper than that and you’ll want to set up terrace growing areas.

If you have a flat space, you can simply mound soil in whatever shape and size you’d like. To best use the space, try using circles in your designs.

A mandala-shaped garden can use every inch and edge you have.
Keyhole garden design is equally effective, especially in small spaces.

Ring all these garden areas with as many perennial bushes, vines, and trees as you can to further keep the soil, water, and nutrients in place.

Each of these steps will slowly and surely rehabilitate the rocky soil. In not too long, the rocky soil won’t even be recognizable because it will look like actual garden dirt!

By the way, rocks themselves can be used to ring the growing beds to prevent water and soil loss. Simply place them along the edges of the ground beds.

Benefits of Rocky Soil

I know if you’ve ever tried to plunge a soil into rocky ground, you may not be willing to entertain the idea that rocky soil has any benefits. Bear with me.

The fact is, rocks:

Shed Minerals – Albeit slowly, but rocks in the soil mean you’ll always have a certain amount of mineral content in your soil!
Sequester Water – Have you ever noticed that five days after a rain, you can go out in a field, pick up a rock, and the soil is still wet or damp? Water is safer under rocks than it is in bare soil.
Prevent Compaction – Again, if you’ve tried to dig rocky soil, you know this one is true! Even in clay soils, the presence of rocks means that there will be less compaction. The soil is less likely to form a hard pan with various size rocks in its profile. (If you happen to have all sand, which is a grade of rock, and heavy clay, you end up with brick-like soil.)
Provide Drainage – Along the same lines, the presence of various size rocks in the soil means that water will be able to move through it without getting bottlenecked and flooding. This is especially true of the rockiest soil of all – sand!
Act as Thermal Batteries – Because of their ability to hold both cold and warmth, rocks provide what’s know as thermal mass. This means that when a rock is exposed to sun all day, it absorbs the light energy and radiates it out all night as heat. This can be very useful around tender perennials in cold winter climates.

Similarly, a rock can be used to cool a plant. I usually place a flat stone at the base of my clematis vines where they are shaded all summer long by companion plants like comfrey and strawberry.

This shade battery acts as a cooling counter measure along the vine’s shallow root system. The stones work as a counter-measure against summer’s heat, which would otherwise cause my clematis to wilt like a debutante at a summer cotillion.

Permaculture & Rocky Soil

Since you already have the rocks on site, you may as well make use of them! Permaculture teaches us a few principles that can help us develop a healthy respect for rocks and their uses on the homestead.

For example, permaculture reminds us that:

The first principle of permaculture is to observe how nature operates and emulate those systems on the homestead. This principle is called biomimicry. If nature includes various grade rocks in soil to prevent compaction and erosion, maybe you should, too.
The second principle of permaculture teaches us that we should seek to store energy on the homestead and in the land in every way possible. As we mentioned above, rocks do this in many ways, not the least of which is acting as thermal batteries where needed.
The third principle of permaculture is to obtain a yield. Where rocky soil is concerned, applying this principle will help us shift our mindset about stones just a bit. We have the rocks available without any effort or input on our part – they’re a free resource we can train ourselves to think of as a gift! (See below for a list of suggestions of how to use rocks on the homestead.)
The fifth principle of permaculture reminds us that small, slow, natural solutions are usually best. If we can solve a problem with the least amount of off-site technology and effort, then will save money, time, and energy. If you already have various grade rock available on your homestead, why bother hauling in garden path pebbles?!
The sixth principle of permaculture exhorts us to reduce, reuse, and recycle materials inside the homestead as often as we can. Again, this saves time, money, and our own personal efforts. It also changes what we think of as waste. If we already have the rocks, let’s make use of them instead of purchasing an outside product to create the same effect.

We could go on and on through all of the twelve permaculture principles, but I think you get the idea. Rocks are actually pretty awesome!

Use Rocks to Make/As:

Garden Beds (You can place them along the contour of the land a lot easier than logs!)
Thermal Mass for Herb Spirals, Walls, Planters, Walls for Cold Frames, Etc.
Check Dams (These are simple rock dams that prevent erosion and hold water in the landscape.)
Garden Terraces
Mass Heaters for the Home
Steps & Patios
Pathways & Pathway Edges
Livestock Yard Material
Rock Corner Post (For a fence)
Natural Building Material (Rubble Trench & Stemwall)
Hole Fillers
Tools (Forgot your hammer or t-post pounder? Use a rock!)

And that’s just a short list! For what can you use rocks around your homestead?

Livestock & Rocky Soil

There are several species of livestock that are particularly adept at living on rocky soil.

Ruminants like goats and alpacas can handle rocky soil well since their geographical points of origin are natively quite rocky. Ruminants also use rocky soil to naturally trim and file their ever-growing hooves.

Donkeys are rugged on tough terrain, as well. Their adaptable and don’t need tons of space to be happy.

Not only will livestock keep down native plant growth in the rocky soil areas, but they’ll also fertilize with their manure as they move about.

Best Way to Till Rocky Soil – Don’t!

If you have rocky soil that you would like to have lightly tilled, acquire heritage breeds of pig like Ossabaws that are known for their strong snouts. These fantastic pigs dig and root around in the soil all day long.

They’re looking for grubs, tasty roots, and other morsels. In the process, the naturally root out rocks of all shapes and sizes.

These rocks are brought to the surface of the soil where you can easily rake them up, sort them according to size, and then put them to use.

No need to try to find a piece of equipment that will till rocky soil for you when pigs will do it with ease!

Chickens are particularly adept at navigating rocky soil, with their incessant scratching and sharp beaks. They’re tilling capacity is not as deep as pigs but they’re persistent and can expose and break up rocky soil over time.

Ducks and geese will also make a go of it, but since rocky soil often also means dry soil, chickens are a little better suited to rocky soils.

How Do You Soften Hard Rocky Soil?

This is a common question, so I thought I’d address it separately. The best way to soften hard, rocky soil is to apply mulch materials over a full year.

Just keep piling them up and then examine the soil. Take notes, dig up the dirt, feel it, smell it, squish it in your hands, and take notes.

There will still be rocks, but the soil should:

Be more loose, and lighter – the official phrase for this is friable.
Look darker than when you began and even have decomposing material in it.
Hopefully have worms and insects running through it.
Retain moisture from rains.

Next Steps

The next step to breaking up truly hard soil is to start planting tough root veggies like mangels or turnips to further break up the soil.

In places where it’s appropriate, start considering perennial plants like the following:

Perennial Bulbs

Perennial Flowering & Fruiting Bushes

Perennial Flowers

These perennial plants put down extensive root systems that fan out and mine nutrients from deep in the soil. Those roots are like little apartment complexes for beneficial microbes and critters in the soil.

The perennial plants also shed carbon into the soil through root shed (sometimes bits of the roots structure die off), and some even take nitrogen out of the air and fix it on their roots in little nodes.

Those same roots retain water in the soil for all to the other plants to use – trees do this best of all.

Over time, all these small and simple actions will transform your rocky soil into rich, dark dirt that will help you grow your own food and enjoy homestead abundance!

For further reading, I highly recommend Gabe Brown’s book, Dirt to Soil. You wouldn’t think a book about dirt would rock your homestead world, but it will!

–>>Pin This Article for Later<<–

What to Do with a Backyard Full of Rocks?