A Riot of Poppies

Today’s photos are a riot of poppies. The premature spring has brought them up everywhere, even on the Kali Strata. If you want to see total spring pleasure, watch the bees. They roll and roll in the wobbling flowers until they are completely covered in pollen and all the petals have fallen off the poppy. Then they struggle off to the next one, totally weighed down with the golden cargo.

With the change in the clocks the long afternoons have started, giving that extra bit of daylight at the end of the working day for pottering in the green house and tweaking things in the garden. Neat rows of germinating radishes, lettuces, parsley and basil are already coming up in the trench beds and the roses show promise of a fine display to come in a week or so. Of course the things that thrive by eating the above are also hatching and munching with alacrity and much of last year’s flat-leafed parsley crop is now alive with newly hatched hoppers. Fortunately at this stage it is still quite easy to squash them – they are too small and inexperienced to realize they should move when the hand of doom passes overhead. Left unchecked they eat everything in sight and rapidly become the size of small birds, but a lot more destructive.

Have a good week. I’m going home to dig up some new potatoes for supper.

Regards,
Adriana