Friday, October 10, 2014

FLANDERS POPPIES

One of my strongest memories of my paternal grandfather was of him pottering in the garden.
He had a way with plants, as has his son ( my father) and he was always propagating and pottering.

He was a veteran of World War 1, traveling all the way to the war by ship with his brother who died from the dreadful flu epidemic without seeing any action on the war front.
Pop saw action in France and was a runner between the trenches carrying messages
 - a very dangerous task I imagine !
But then everything was dangerous in that dreadful war.

Pop was a very staunch member of the Returned Soldiers' League and the family treasures the citation for his services to the Cairns branch throughout WWII.

No matter where he lived his garden always contained some red poppies.
Every year these poppies would magically appear originating from self sown seeds of the flowers of the previous year.




Bright spots of red would bob up all over the place.
When I asked him he called them Flanders Poppies but never said any more about them
 but they are the flower that I most associate with him all these years later.

Now, of course, I know the significance of them and have seen them growing wild in France and England too.


Recently, on a whim, I searched the internet to see if it was possible to buy seeds with thoughts of them popping up in my garden as they had for him.
I was surprised to find them easily and soon dispatched an order for 1000 poppy seeds for the princely sum of $1.99 !
 Now I have to say that I have never seen these poppies growing anywhere except my grandfather's garden so I guessed from that that there might be a problem with growing them here in semi tropical Brisbane.
At first I gently scattered a very small amount of seed into a pot , gently covered them and watered and waited.... and waited.......and waited.

Nothing happened and I left the whole idea for a while.
  Then one day I came upon the seeds - such tiny specks of seeds -and thought I'd give them one more go.
So I sprinkled them ALL into this small pot and just watered it.
No covering the seeds with soil, no fuss. Nothing to lose ....
and do you know I think every single seed germinated !

990 tiny little plants all jammed in together !!! 


The instructions said they should be planted where they were to grow.
The did not transplant well.
Oh dear !
Well today I've carefully taken a few chunks of plants off one side of the mass, separated them into smaller clumps and planted them out into a bigger pot.


I've also planted a few small clumps into the dry stony ground that is our garden.
All I can do now is try to keep them alive with water and a little gentle fertilizer and cross my fingers.
It may be too hot here ... but then it's very hot in the south of France so you never know.

~~~~~~~~~~~ 

The big blue pots with their pretty annuals are now adding colour to the front of our house and seem to be doing well. Let's hope they can withstand the heat for a little while at least






As you can see our front yard needs all the help it can get!

A long dry Winter, no Spring rains and lots of windy days has left our front lawn very parched indeed.
Yes, this is a true colour photo of the dry, crackly stuff that is our front lawn


and with no rain to fill the tank there'll be no green grass here till it rains.
(It's too expensive to water the lawn with town water)


Cheers.

26 comments:

  1. How wonderful re the poppies...I hope yours do well, Helsie. I can't see any reason why they shouldn't. We grew them when I was kid growing up in Gympie....of various colours. Good luck with them. :)

    It would be great to see some good rain. I love the rain; not the wild storms, but good, steady rain for a couple or so days...then a break...and then some more. Let's be honest...I love rainy days and rainy nights!

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    1. I love rainy days and rainy nights too Lee. It's been such a windy Winter too which just makes everything drier.

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  2. I memorized In Flanders Field as a child in elementary school and have never forgotten it. I think of that poem whenever I see red poppies. How great to have planted some in your garden pots. I hope they do well for you.
    Your blue pots are lovely. Yes, without rain the grass gets so dry and brown - our grass browns every summer but greens up nicely once the autumn rains begin. That's now - things are looking lush out there in spite of the leaves falling from the trees.

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    1. Glad someone is getting rain then Lorrie ! I'm hopeful but not confident with the poppies.

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  3. What a lovely idea - I think I will seek out some poppy seeds
    Julie xxxxxxx

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    1. I have see fields of them in the northern parts of England Julie and Sue from The Quince Tree up in Shropshire regularly posts photos so there must be lots up her way. Absolutely lovely!

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  4. You guys definitely need some rain Helen don't you? Poppies would have to be one of my all time favourite flowers. If they don't take, just try again next year. Lovely memories of your Pop.

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    1. They are certainly a sight to see when there are a mass of them Carol. They certainly know how to do fields of wild flowers in England.

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  5. good luck with your poppies.We have Welsh poppies here,orange and yellow.I scatter seeds every year but they seem to have a mind of their own and pop up all over the place!!Your pots look great but your lawn looks very sad.Barbarax

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    1. The multi-coloured orange and yellow poppies we have here are called Iceland Poppies . I think they could be the same as the ones you mention and grow easily. The ones with the opium in them are banned except on licenced farms for medical use but I'm sure I've seen similar ones growing in gardens in the UK ! You never see these red ones though so I think there is a problem growing them.

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  6. A beautiful post Helen . Loved hearing about your grandfather and his name for these poppies . How lovely you were able to grow some.

    Nice to see someone with a lawn that looks worse than mine!

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    1. Plastic flowers are soon to be the answer in our house Shay !!!

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  7. So many places in England have been growing poppies as a remembrance this year. Our local roundabouts have looked beautiful covered in red. They aren't always easy to grow so I hope your will survive.

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    1. I gathered they were not easy to cultivate Elizabeth so I am not confident they will go on to produce flowers. Anyway my low expectations will mean I'll be twice as happy if any survive to flower. !!

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  8. Lovely memories! Did you know the poppy seeds can live in the ground for a very long time and not grow, then at some point if the ground is disturbed somehow, they will suddenly all grow... maybe yours will grow when you're not expecting it, and if you let the seeds from your growing ones fall where you'd like a little patch of seeds, you never know what might happen! If they don't grow, next spring go and rake the soil a bit and see if that helps!

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    1. If they don't get to flowering this year Louise I'm going to buy another lot of seeds and just scatter them in the garden and forget about them and hope. If I can just get a couple of flowers they might just take care of the whole process themselves.

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  9. Hi Helsie. I do hope they will grow. I have a feeling that poppies thrive on neglect so I would go easy on the fertiliser. I think they like dry, well-drained conditions too. I see a lot more growing in chalky soil areas too so perhaps they like alkaline soil. (Would that be right?) All I know is my soil is acid and I never see any round here, only the yellow and orange ones.
    I look forward to seeing your photos some day soon of Helsie-land's bright red poppies.

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  10. Oops ! I fertilized them yesterday ! I was warned they do not transplant well and I have tried to break up the very thick clump which was the result of just dropping all the seeds in one pot so I'm not very hopeful of great success. It would be wonderful though wouldn't it?

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  11. Fingers crossed that at least some survive. Its a lot drier in Bris than it is up on the coast. Most lawns are still greenish around Noosa.

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    1. Yes Marg, it's always greener up there. It's a pity that the lawns aren't green to set off the Jacarandas that are coming into bloom.

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  12. Good luck with the poppies. Lovely flowers but they don't last for long. I love to see them in golden wheatfields though modern weed control means that this sight is less common in England than it used to be.

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  13. Hi Helsie, I don't know if you've seen the Poppy Art Installation that's on at the Tower of London at the moment, I've been lucky enough to see it twice so far and it is breathtaking. Here's the link in case you're interested: http://poppies.hrp.org.uk/

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  14. Yes, Angie I have seen photos of it. It's stunning isn't it, especially the photos taken from a distance. Clever people to think these things up. Would be wonderful to see it in person.Thanks for the link.

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  15. I hope your poppies will grow. I have seen them wild in California, in red and in orange colors too. In France the remembrance flower for WWI is the “bleuet” or blue cornflower. I have not seen poppies in Georgia – maybe it is too warm and the soil is mostly clay.

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  16. You both OK, Helsie? Not seen you being active on your blog for a bit, which is unusual. Hope you are alright.

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