Dazzling gardens cheap to cultivate
When England was divided into nobles and peasants, the people’s garden was born. The plots erupted around small huts and stone cottages throughout the countryside, where regular summer rain and moderate temperatures made gardening a national pastime. Many of those peasants worked for the landed gentry on enormous estates. From their activities at work, the gardeners would obtain seeds, roots and cuttings of all sorts of amazing plants gathered from the far reaches of the British Empire.
That’s why English cottage gardens became the crazy quilt of flowering landscapes. These ordinary folks weren’t designers, just gardeners who loved flowers and color. They grew anything they obtained free of charge from the wild or gleaned from more sophisticated gardens.
These days a lot of us feel like peasants as the economy lags and money remains tight. However, the one hobby that is open to each of us is gardening, and it’s cheap if you grow flowers from seed. When you order vegetable seed from catalogs, throw in a couple of extra packets of easy-to-grow annuals. Flowers that grow big and bold in just one season provide the best value for every dollar spent. They were favorites in England, too, because they can transform a rented, dull or tired landscape in just a few weeks.
My favorites are those eager to grow from seed by germinating quickly. If left to go to seed, many self sow, which means the flowers shed mature seeds onto the ground around them, where they overwinter and grow like wildflowers the following year. You can also harvest the mature seed and save it to sow more formally next year. Dozens of gardeners are harvesting their seed to sell on eBay, another resource for lots of flower seed at rock bottom prices. The best part about buying flower seed from seed catalogs is the wide range of color variations they offer. You won’t find that in store seed racks.
To transform your yard, look to these old standbys that have graced grandmothers’ yards and those of the rural English cottagers for centuries. Spend money now to get started, then harvest your seed to grow bigger and better displays every year for free.