Gardener’s Notebook

and many of our traditional favorites.

If we picture a cottage garden, it wouldn’t be only the traditional straight ‘row on row’ of plants; the plants and the form of the garden would be a bit looser, more casual with more curving lines, and a thicker than normal planting to make it look like all our plants are tumbling into one another with joy. (Now a note for gardeners who like the straight and narrow rows of veg: you can still go with that for maximum productivity and ease of weeding; but why not consider having a corner of the garden a little more relaxed, with colorful plants and wavy edges? Or, rather than have a twenty foot row of beets or beans, break it up with a small circle of flowers planted in the middle, maybe extending over a couple rows: It will give color, interest, and will help attract beneficial insects! Be a little daring, use your imagination, and you can have the best of both worlds!)

A cottage garden also has a selection of herbs: pretty to look at and delicious to eat! If you have room for only a few, pick the best-loved and mostused: dill, parsley, rosemary, sage, thyme. If you are running out of garden space, remember that herbs do very well in containers, so you can keep a collection near your back step for easy access while you are cooking!

The wonderful thing about gardening is that there is always something new for us to try, and it doesn’t matter if we have a big garden or a more compact space or just a collection of containers holding our favorites! I’m thinking that the imaginative gardener can easily grow a “container cottage garden” with a mixture of vegetables in containers, flowers, and then a few containers of herbs! And the beauty of this is that you can moved them around so that they are always looking interesting! Thank you to our friends at YTW for their continues fine work! Great to see our local news.

Gardeners, what will be your garden trend for this year? Think about it and have a great week!