Cottage plants

If you have a cottage and you have another life in the city or suburbs, then don't try to recreate your urban garden in the bush. Think of the plants in your yard that grow and bloom and delight, without an ounce of human intervention, and consider those for cottage culture.

I don't have a cottage, but if I did have one, I would let the woods be woods, I would worship the beauty of rocks and marshes, and generally I would leave the natural order of things alone.

So maybe the woods at the cottage is not full of trillium and bloodroot, but I bet there are ferns and native impatiens and Solomon's seal. Likely they grow in big, pleasing drifts, and there's a sense of peace that happens easily and without intervention.

Absorb the native beauty around your cottage, and then really consider if you want to engineer another garden style in the wild paradise.

If bush country beauty just isn't enough to adore, then a gingerly introduction of garden plants may be in order.

Here's where I would refer to the foot soldiers of the home garden. The TGIF plants that will pop open a bloom, just as you pour out of car for a weekend at the "Tie One On" cottage.

Can you find an easier plant to grow than columbine? Here's a plant that is as exotic looking as an orchid, yet largely uncelebrated. The wild columbine, Aquilegia canadensis, with its attractive red and yellow flowers actually prefers the usually troublesome location of dry shade. This plant is attractive to birds and butterflies. Supplement the wild columbine with any number of cultivated types that feature sumptuous colours and shapes.

Coreopsis is a perennial that electrifies the garden, with shocking yellow flowers that open over many weeks. Plant it in full sun, in dry spots and forget about it. The native Coreopsis tripteris is attractive to birds.

Coneflowers are joyous plants that like full sun, evoke the meadow and are simple to grow. The big purple flowers have arresting orange cone-like centres. The native one, Echinacea pallida is pale purple, and a great lure for the delightful goldfinches.

In sunny, wet areas, grow the glorious Joe-Pye weed, Eupatorium purpureum, the purple, globe like flowers of August- September are sought after by butterflies.

In late summer, New England aster, Aster novae angliae, blooms abundantly in full sun, in dry conditions, and is a magnet for butterflies.

Native is nice in cottage country, but some other indispensable garden plants could make the pilgrimage.

Daylilies will be fine without much human contact. New types will bloom over many weeks, on stems as sturdy as an axe handle. The latest oranges and reds will pulsate like a neon sign.

Any of the sedums will thrive in isolation. Some of them have a happy habit of blooming late in the season, when many other plants are flea bitten. They survive in crevices and cracks, also in containers. Sedums are tough plants with little need for water or any other pampering.

Forget frail plants at the cottage; choose native ones, or plants with good character that fend for themselves. Then relax the rules and allow a little chaos into the cottage garden.