The Happy Cottage

Small Garden Journal

This blog began in Jan. 2017 on a cold bright winter day in our 1945 cottage home in Durham, NC. Photos of the Spring 2016 garden inspired me. Winter is after all, the perfect time for gardeners to daydream of Spring. Monthly posts highlight what's happening in our Zone 7 Piedmont garden which includes small wildlife and occasional updates of what's happening inside the cottage. In 2015 we renovated the house next door and are enjoying starting garden beds there as well.

Visit the Butterfly Compendium to see a catalog of pollinators in the garden and host plant information. View this and other favorites in the Featured Posts section of the blog (to the right of the most recent post).

Gardening/lifestyle ethos at The Happy Cottage: support Mother Earth and yourself by being as natural as possible. Avoid the use of synthetic chemicals and weed instead of spray. Include host and nectar plants for pollinators. Favorite garden medium: organic mushroom compost. It's the soil that mushrooms were grown in. Full disclosure: We do use biological mosquito dunks.

My gardening style has evolved over twenty years to include scent, food for pollinators, butterflies, birds and shelter for small creatures. A multi-dimensional garden will bring you years of enjoyment!

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Tornado and Rain

What a crazy few days. Our neighborhood was visited by a tornado on May 23th. Amazingly, very little damage occurred when you consider how many trees we have. Unfortunately, some people did sustain damage to their home from falling trees. 5/28/22 I'll have to walk the "very little damage" statement back. Ian saw another oak that had fallen last night on a home on Club Blvd. The tornado stayed high when it came through Northgate Park, so it didn't touch down. We lost pow

Mid-Spring Hues, Early May 2022

Wild yellow oxalis plants have crept into the garden. I will leave them as this is a happy circumstance. The delicate pops of yellow add interest to the purple and pink color theme. This is an easy trick to achieve a naturalized look in your garden beds. If the "weed" looks good, leave it. Eventually, you might have to cull a few, but this is the case with many plants. The pink primroses are taking over this year. I will probably need to remove a few at the end of seaso