Self-seeders

Today I’m going to talk about the self-seeding plants I have in my garden, and since it’s November the 11^th, Remembrance Day, I’m going to start with the poppies.

I have bought punnets of Flanders field poppies from time to time (usually available in the shops from late autumn) and I now get poppies coming up willy-nilly in the front yard. This year’s poppy has come up in my newly-created garden bed but often they will just pop up where they can. 

This one is from a couple of years ago. I love them!

The other punnet planted self-seeders are these coastal daisies or erigeron. The design of this bed was actually prompted by a sense of nostalgia, since I had the whole of my side garden area (not a huge area by the way) planted with it at my previous home, with narrow meandering paths weaving their way through it. I like the look – it’s always been my dream to have a meadow and this is the closest, lowest maintenance effect I could find. 

They are perennials and I have irises (in spring), trees, lavender and roses thrown in there as well. So it’s a sort of field I guess. The erigeron has a tendency to smother a lot of plants so it’s difficult to have variety on the same height level because it just gets taken over. I also prune it down in winter to keep the height down a bit. Anyway, what started as two or three punnets has quickly spread to cover the area.

When I first moved in here, faced with the prospect of designing and planting most of the yard, I went for some short-term solutions by throwing in some seeds. 

Most didn't come up or perhaps were eaten when they were too small to be noticeable. 

Nasturtiums did. And every winter they create a sea of green, and then flower in spring. Summers here are too hot for them and they have usually gone by Christmas.