My Poppies 2013

I love them to and wait eagerly each year for their too short season.

your poppies are adorable i do so love yellow and blue ones.

they cetainly all look very good.

nice how and where they have flowered too.

from jane.

What a gorgeous selection of poppies and that blue one is brilliant as are the asiatic ones. I have the yellow welsh poppies spreading around the garden but the others seem to last only a season, never to return!

I love poppies too, love your meconopsis, stunning colour!

I like your poppies. They are very colourful.
There were some clumps of lovely M cambrica in the hedgerow outside the back of my garden earlier, but the council mowed them all down ... the stupid lot !

Gorgeous, one and all Scotsgran. Patties Plum been on my wish list for a long time. I've never seen it for sale up here. If you ever find it on one of your many jaunts pick me one up too please :)

Beautiful poppies! The Himalayan one goes right to my heart, I don't know why. I have both yellow and orange Welsh ones if anybody wants some seed.

What beautiful poppies! I have Welsh ones self-seeding all over the place. I keep deadheading them, and they go on right through summer, then I leave them to seed again. I got some seed from Mum last year, so now I have lovely red poppies as well. They don't last long, but they are so attractive. I love your blue one.

Fabulous. The Meconopsis with the Welsh poppies is a lovely combination.

Lovely collection. Lovely photographs.

Thank you everybody. Shock horror, I bought this blue poppy as Meconopsis sheldonii (syn Lingholm). I googled it and found it was raised by WG Sheldon in Oxted in Surrey. So an English hybrid. This one, unusual for meconopsis is fertile and can be allowed to self seed. Apparently it has double or three times the usual number of chromosomes compared to other mecs. The seedlings must have the first years flowers removed to allow the plant to build up as once it flowers it dies. The flower should produce between 15 and 20 football shaped seeds. If they all survive as seedlings I hope to have a few more in years to come.
The new asiatic poppies are all in pots and will be decanted in to a border when it is cleaned out and ready for planting. They do tend to disappear over the winter so I wonder if that is what has happened to yours Gee and you have replanted the area not realising they were there.

Fantastic poppies.I love Meconopsis but can't grow them here!

I sourced a Patty's Plum yesterday. I'll look forward to seeing it in the garden next year. Sent you a pm Scottish. Here ia a link to the National Collection of Papaver
http://www.plantaholic.co.uk
it is an interesting site.

I got a lovely surprise yesterday to find one of what I thought were three blue meconopsis plants produced a white flower. I've added a photo.

How lovely! Are they perennial, or do they reseed each year?

A few poppies have raised themselves up, Scotsgran! I am so pleased. That white one is lovely, is it a different species or a mutation (horrible word!)?

They should be perennials. The reason I had to cut off the flowers the first year was to allow the plant to build up. I have just found the label for the white one M. betonicifolia var. alba (syn. M. baileyi alba) I bought it last year 27.5.12 at the NTS Branklyn Garden 'Poppy Day'. We had been to visit Jean Band's garden earlier in the day and decided to have a peek at Branklyn. They have a huge collection of poppies growing in the garden which is situated on a steep hill overlooking Perth. It must have flowered before I bought it because I did not need to take the flowers off this particular plant. I'm hoping that it will seed because one plant is not enough to give a good show. If I find I can grow a plant I tend to collect others in the same family. Because the Welsh ones were happy I hoped I could grow the others and I have my fingers crossed that they will come back next year again. This is the first time I have had these flowering.

thanks for all the great info scotsgran! Especially for the blue poppy, now I know what it is and where from, I shall look out for it, and treat it as you say.Poppies are wonderful plants.

Exellent blog.

I have just sprinkled the seeds from my papaver poppies - they were in danger of getting quite soggy in the rain. I hope some might come up, but I know the original plant should come back anyway. It's a rather pretty pale pink, but provides a variable performance.

Mel the Papaver poppies take easily from root cuttings.

I'll have to give it a go. When would you recommend I do it, please?

Late autumn or early winter is the best time. The RHS say to dig up a vigorous plant and wash the roots. Cut away up to one third of the root - should be stout roots - and replant the parent plant immediately. http://apps.rhs.org.uk/advicesearch.
They say use 2 - 4" long cuttings. I have always used 1" cuttings. They say plant the cuttings with the growing edge, the bit that was closer to the plant before you cut it off, just under the surface of the compost. That cut should be straight across the other end should be on a slant. I have always just cut mine straight at both ends. Plant 2" apart in a pot. Finish the pot with a small layer (1cm) of grit. Water, then place in a cold greenhouse or cold frame. In spring you should have new small plants. When they are growing well, roots showing coming out the holes in the bottom of the pot, plant them in to their own pots. Plant them out in the following autumn or Spring. I look forward to seeing them next Spring.

Thank you so much for the info, Scotsgran. I have put it into my favourites to consult later on in the year.

Me, too, Melchisdec.
Thanks, Scotsgran!

I am about to do the same with this very useful information. My thanks too, SG.

I found another but annual poppy in flower today. I do like the fleshy leaves as well as the big pink flowers. I will post a photo soon.