POPPY LOVE

Monty Don adores self-seeding opium poppies, from white to blazing red – even though they keep popping up all over his garden

This year the poppies seem bigger, better and more abundant than ever. Perhaps I say that every year. Perhaps, as the years go by, I realise ever more how piercingly beautiful and precious they are. When I say ‘the poppies’, I am referring to the self-seeding opium poppies, Papaver somniferum, that are scattered right across my garden. These are extra tall with a lovely, generous greygreen (glaucous) foliage and flowers that vary from simple petals with a silky sheen to fluffy, concentrated balls. Some have cut fringes and others create such a mass of petals that they are almost circular. ‘Black peony’ has an intense plum colour and, at the other end of the palette, ‘White Cloud’ is perfect for a white border. I also love the crested heads of the Laciniatum type that look like spectacular headdresses for a day or so before they fully open. They are an annual, but like many poppies, the seeds can remain dormant for years until the right moment arrives and they burst into life. Anyway, in this garden the right moment has arrived and they are spread everywhere, in among vegetables, borders, cut flowers and the cracks in paving. Nothing in the garden is more welcome.

Opium poppies are very promiscuous and will hybridise freely with each other, so the purist would not like my live-and-let-live approach. Apart from anything else, it means that the majority are a slightly anodyne pink – but not, to my mind at least, anodyne enough to stop them being lovely. It also means that my best-laid plans for maintaining a colour scheme are blown wide apart. Pale pink pops up in the strictly rich tones of the jewel garden, and deep purples and blazing reds happily mingle with the otherwise pure white flowers of the writing garden. It is poppy anarchy but I love them for it.

If any are really clashing, I pick them for cut flowers, although really the best time to do this is before they bloom. Pick them as soon as the buds straighten, which is the sign that they are about to flower. Dip the cut ends in boiling water for 30 seconds and they should last for up to a week, which is longer than they will last outside.

You can increase the chances of good or ‘true’ flower heads by selecting the parents. The best way to do this is to identify those you really like – even if they are flowering in the wrong place – and tie a bit of twine or, better still, ribbon the same colour as the petals, around the stem to mark them. When the seed heads have lost their bloom, but before they start to dry out, pull up the poppy, roots and all, fix a paper bag around the seed heads, then hang it upside down in a shed. It will continue to dry out and the seeds can then be shaken into the bag ready for sowing. Not all will come true but the chances are high.

You can sow poppies in autumn to flower the following year or in spring to flower later in the summer. Always sow annual poppies in situ as they hate being moved except when tiny. Either scatter the seed and let them grow where they land or sow thinly in zigzags, circles or crosses so that you can differentiate the seedlings from weeds. When they have finished flowering, the leaves will shrivel to a dirty brown, so I strip them off and leave the naked stems topped by a rattling tawny case of seeds – any of these that the birds do not eat will scatter and start the selfsown cycle all over again.

Monty with his poppies