Dotted with Daisies

In the beginning, there were only three clumps of shasta daisies in the cottage garden. Although the daisies looked great with the sunny yellow daylily 'Happy Returns', I was spending too much time watering all of those perennials. Wrong plants in the wrong place. I began converting that area to xeric plants. The daisies and daylilies needed a new location so that I could replace them with lavender, salvia greggii, agastache, stachys and sedum.

In September 2009, I moved the daisies to the deer resistant garden. The three clumps were divided into small pieces and planted wherever I could find a bare spot along the garden path. I considered the arrangement temporary—just a holding area. I planted between perennials and between the spirea (top photo, click to enlarge). I had to plant all along the path because the three clumps quickly became nine clumps.

There was so much rain in the winter, I was sure they would drown. Not so. The daisies loved all that moisture. Each clump grew quite large and I even made a few more divisions in April. Since the foliage looked so healthy and happy, I decided to leave the daisies alone for this year.

The daisies are quite enjoyable when strolling along the path. The blooms are large and flat and the viewing is cheerful. It wasn't until I started taking photos that I realized the funny arrangement.

Now that the daisies are in full bloom, the resulting design (or, lack of) looks somewhat like polka dots along the path!

The more I look at the photos, the more I realize that the white dotted pattern (nearly every other plant is a daisy) is really quite noticeable. There are only a few clumps shown in the photos below, so you can imagine how it looks for the entire length of the path!

Given that this was to be a temporary holding location, I'm not beating myself up about it. I'll eventually rearrange the daisies into mass plantings. While I now have the right plants in the right place—I have the wrong design!

Words and photos by Freda Cameron, Defining Your Home, Garden and Travel. All company or product or patented names mentioned are registered trademarks, copyrights, or patents owned by those respective companies or persons.