Cottage gardens should be filled with flowers all season long. Grow these pretty and popular annual flowers for masses of easy color in the cottage garden.

Annual flowers are perfect for planting in the cottage style flower garden. Their bright colors, quick growth and temporary nature (annuals are replanted every year) encourage the gardener to experiment with new flowers. Annuals grown from seed are inexpensive and so can be used in quantity to bring a full, exuberant look to the cottage garden. And their long flowering display brings easy, rampant color to the garden all season. There are so many annuals you can use, see the list of popular cottage garden annual flowers below.

What makes a good cottage garden annual? First off, it should be easy to grow in the garden. This means no fussy coddling. The best annuals will bloom generously all season from spring through fall frost, but the generously overflowing cottage garden typically also includes early and late season bloomers.

Next, it should grow easily from seed. Transplants are fine, too, but the optimal cottage garden flowers should give good results when directly seeded in the garden. Furthermore, the best annual flowers for a cottage garden are those that are apt to self seed or reseed themselves in the garden.

Self Seeding Annuals Plant Themselves

Self seeding flowers make the gardener's job easy. To encourage self seeding, many cottage gardeners prefer to use heirloom flowers or open pollinated seed strains. Unlike many hybrids, these will “come true” from seed. This means seedlings will be fairly consistent year after year. It also allows the gardener to develop a seed strain suited to the garden by culling and roguing the plants over time so only the best are allowed to propagate. Eventually, through this ongoing strict selective process, the seedling plants will be ideally suited to the growing conditions and will meet the discerning eye of the gardener.

Select the Best Annuals for Your Cottage Garden

The best annual flowers (and annual flowering vines) for your cottage garden will reflect the gardener’s preferences and the growing conditions in the garden. A shaded garden will favor shade tolerant flowers, a hot and sunny garden will suit plants that love hot sun. Soil type also plays a role, in that some flowers prefer heavy soil and some prefer sand or some may need an acidic soil while others need a more neutral or alkaline soil to grow their best. Luckily, many popular garden annuals tolerate a wide range of conditions.

Annuals that are especially well suited to your garden will seed down or reseed (unless deadheaded rigorously) and so will come back for you, and you can certainly save seeds to plant the following year. Experiment and see what works best for you!

List of Favorite Annual Flowers and Vines for Cottage Gardens

Amaranth

Calendula

Cardinal vine

Centaurea (cornflower)

Chamomile

China aster

Cleome

Cosmos

Euphorbia marginata

Gomphrena

Impatiens

Larkspur (may be biennial)

Marigold

Morning glory

Nasturtium

Nicotiana

Nigella

Poppy

Purple hyacinth bean

Snapdragon

Statice

Strawflower

Sunflower

Sweet pea

Ten week stock

Tithonia

Verbena

Viola

Zinnia

More Kinds of Annual Flowers for Cottage Gardens

Cottage gardens are renowned for their wide variety of flowers and “anything goes” plant selection. Be sure to try some of the annual native plants or wildflowers you see in your local area. Also consider growing ornamental annual herbs and vegetables with attractive flowers such as coriander, dill, cherry tomatoes, okra, and squashes. (See Cottage Garden Flowers for more suggested cottage garden flowers, including flower bulbs, biennials and perennials. You might also enjoy reading about the many flowers our grandmothers grew in their gardens.)

More Reasons to Plant Annuals in Your Cottage Garden

Annuals are the perfect addition to a newly established cottage garden, or for infill in a cottage style perennial garden suffering from “gaps.” Annual flowers grown from seed provide a bounty of flowers at little cost. In the cottage garden, self seeding annuals often make up the backbone of the colorful display. Every cottage garden plan should include a wide selection of these hardworking – and beautiful -- annual flowers!

more FLOWER GARDENS ARTICLES and FLOWER GARDENS BLOGS Copyright August 6, 2007 Barbara Martin All Rights Reserved