DIY | Dry Stack Fieldstone Wall or Planter

I am not a professional stone mason
I am not a contractor
I am not a structural engineer

I AM a home owner with big ideas and little funds
I AM a persistent guy with little fear of failure
I AM willing to tear it all down and try again

Check with your local building codes before you begin, make sure there are no restrictions regarding the construction of retaining walls or free standing walls.  Also, be realistic and safe about what you are about to do.

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There are a few pictures and resources on the internet about building a dry stack, round field stone wall.  My intent is to add to the volume of information on this process by including pictures of my build-up as well as put in links to some of the more useful websites I found when trying to figure out how to do this.  More detail concerning my key steps are in the captions of my pictures, so I’ll let them speak for themselves.    Here are a few things you should know before you get started.

1. Don’t neglect site prep.  I live in Southern California and on some pretty hard dirt.  Freezing dirt and frost thrust and all that jazz is just fairytale to me.  But if you live somewhere that freezes, its worth it to dig down nice and deep and put a gravel base in.
2. Natural field stone doesn’t have to be expensive, in fact, it doesn’t have to cost more than a little fuel to go pick it up and lunch for your friends who help you move it.  Any BLM managed land has stone free for the taking as long as you can pick them up by hand and put them in your non-commercial vehicle.  If you aren’t building anything too big, this might be a good option.  If you are building something bigger, take more time and visit more locations.  With a little hunting you can find all the stone material you need.  Don’t be shy about asking around to see if anyone has some stone that was illegally dumped on their property.  Some of these folks are happy to have you come and remove some of the trash that has been left on their property, just ask first.
3. Lay out all of your material ahead of time so you have a good view of it all.  As you are building, remember you are putting together a puzzle with all kinds of pieces that may or may not fit.  Remember that biggest on the bottom, smallest on the top.  Use really small stuff to fill in gaps.
4. Have a lot of DG or soil around that you can shovel in as you go.  You are not using mortar, so you need something to create some friction and to take your stones captive.
5. Don’t be concerned about ‘perfect’.  If you are doing this project, perfect actually doesn’t look right.  You want something more natural looking and a few small gaps here and there are ok as long as there is some soil in the gaps.  Its a great opportunity to plant some cool rock rose or some other small, rock-loving plant.

Click on the pictures below to get a better view of what I have done, there is a description with each picture.  Remember, I am not a professional so this shouldn’t be considered professional advise.  Think of me as your neighbor who did this last year and is willing to offer some pointers from his experience.  I successfully built a wall that is stable and has survived rain and a dog running around on it.  It fits in nicely to a rustic setting and as long as you stay within some simple guidelines, your wall will be successful as well.

[Show as slideshow]

I found these websites helpful when I was figuring this out:

DIY Network’s Rock Solid: Corny hosts, but they seem to know their craft.  They handle this topic a lot.
Drystack Retaining Walls (Moss/Field/Stone): PDF uploaded by Cornerstone Marketing Group.  Handy write up on site prep.  I don’t know anything about the authors.
eHow-How to Bulid a Dry Stack Stone Wall: This was handy little taste of building a wall.  No pictures and brief summaries of what do to.  Add it to the knowledge mass.
Google: Yea, its a sarcastic link to add.  But search for dry stack fieldstone retaining walls, maybe its how you found this post.  Keep searching.  There is lots of good stuff out there.

Remember that being persistent and embracing failure as a learning experience will get any project done well.  Since you’re doing a dry stacking wall - taking it down and changing it up is easy stuff.  When you are done you will have a beautiful fixture in your landscape and it will likely remain for years and years.  And guys, your wife will be really impressed!

Have fun!