The happy accident

Deep purple crocus blooms are punctuated by bright orange anthers and highlighted by one lone bright yellow daffodil standing above them. It’s something called a happy accident or beautiful mistake and something that’s always a wonderful occurrence in the garden.

When these crocus bulbs were planted in the fall, I didn’t know they were going to bloom around a daffodil. Photo by Doug Oster

I love to plan, thinking long and hard about what does where and how the plants will work together, but the garden and Mother Nature often have other ideas.

Surprises are one joyful reality of gardening.

I once planted ‘Torch’ tithonia (Mexican sunflower) along a rock wall, expecting it to tower over the bed as the plants reach six feet tall in my part sun garden. When I left for a 10 day vacation, they were standing tall, upon returning the plants had fallen over, but the flowers began to look upwards creating a three foot tall border of pretty orange flowers which softened the stone wall.

Visitors remarked on the beautiful design.

All I could do was say, “I thought about growing them this way all winter long!” We don’t always have to admit our beautiful mistakes, do we?

More from Everybody Gardens

Spring bulbs are here.

Video of the Spring Flower Show at Phipps.