What should i plant in an alley garden?

thyme, basil, oragno and mint

Be careful of mint, it will take over the whole garden and beyond.

carrots, radishes, cherry tomatoes if sun, celery

@ pupntaco then he can rule the garden
@ Kelly carrots won’t do well in less the 6 inches of dirt with asphalt underneath.

gooch’s ideas very good. There are many different and pretty subspecies of thyme, oregano, basil and mints….different kinds of varigated leaves and colours, but they all have root systems that will grow horizontally rather than vertically. Creeping Jenny, myrtle, wild violets, forget-me-nots (both annual from seed and perennial), lilies-of-the-valley also need little soil. Dill and chives, maybe?

marvelous answer, gailcalled!

Thanks. I have a walk made of bluestone pieces, many of which have cracked. I plant the herbs in the cracks (in crappy sand); they run amok after a few years and need a serious hair cut. But when you step on them, they release an aromatic aroma. (And Creeping Jenny aka moneywort aka Lysimachia nummularia isn’t called Creeping Jenny for nothing. Beware)

The myrtle, violets, forget-me-nots, lilies-of-the-valley, marsh marigolds, wild buttercups, sweet woodruff and small spring bulbs (snow drops, mini-daffs, chionodoxia) I grow in the acid and moist soil in my woods. It is a splendid sight for three weeks in the spring and miraculously the deer and rodents leave it all alone – unlike crocusus, tulips and hyacinths.

W. annual forget-me-nots, once you get them started, they reseed. Or walk among them in your socks and then plant socks.

i’m so excited, thank you! i’m going to the garden store tomorrow to get lots of seeds. wish me luck!

Nasturtiums are easy from seed and have shallow roots. Another
beautiful flower that has an easy root system, and will self-seed so that you’ll get some
next year too, is Shirley poppies – many colos of red and pink, blowing in the breeze. Also Cosmos. Tall but fragile in effect. Lots of motion. Will not shade out the shorter things underneath. Gail’s right about forget-me-not. Fabulous is huge swathes.

Also don’t forget Nasturtiums are good to eat. They add a peppery taste to salads!

And you can dip wild violets in sugar or candy them..pretty on desserts. Shirley poppies are annuals in my neck of the woods -zone 4 B. Isn’t there also a short early-blooming phlox that will naturalize if it is happy?

BTW, I snipped some forsythia branches a few days ago during some typical blustery, cold and rainy weather and put them in a vase inside. Bare branches burst into bloom this AM. So cheerful w. all the downed limbs and mud everywhere.