Grow a Prehistoric Garden

If you need a place just for your T-Rex to hang out you might plant a prehistoric garden right in your own backyard. And use exactly the same plants that grew on the earth 300 million years ago.

First, have an adult help you choose a site in a shady corner of the yard. Dig a nice big dinosaur bed and add lots of organic amendment because primitive plants especially need humus to grow. Once you choose a site and dig up the ground real good, make a wide path through the garden with gravel or bark so you and a friend can get inside.

Now it's time to shop for plants. Plants that grew when the pterodactyls flew are:

Also plant sedge grasses and as many ferns as you can fit with names like: button fern, birds nest fern and cinnamon fern. Add a few low growing junipers here and there so smaller dinosaurs have a place to hide.

For finishing touches to your Paleozoic Park add: a small bowl buried up to the rim and filled with water (a pool for predators) and a few big rocks that you've found (paint one like a volcano.) Finally, mulch the garden with small bark or mulch (smells like chocolate) to keep you and your buddies clean.