Packets of seeds distributed and promoted through "Countryfile" ends up with poisonous plants growing throughout the UK. Although found in the UK naturally it was, until this point, thought to be dying out.
tinyurl.com/nh2292j
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Daily Telegraph trying to be the Daily Mail again.
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When I belonged to the Henry Doubleday heritage plant scheme I became a guardian for Corncockle, along with some endangered vegetables. I undertook to sow the seeds, guard the plants, and then harvest the seed and send it back to HD for their seed banks.
I'm pleased to see my efforts have had a result, and there is now enough to distribute more widely.
Corncockle grows in traditional meadows, so is dependent on traditional farming methods - no weedkillers or fertilisers, and annual cutting for hay at the right time. Mine died out after a few years. Obviously I wasn't reproducing these requirements well enough.
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Whilst I generally watch & enjoy Countryfile I do get a bit irritated with the "right-on" PC attitude of John Craven, in particular!
Thank goodness for Adam & his farm!
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Here's what Richard Mabey had to say in the excellent Flora Britannica:
Corncockle, Agrostemma githago (VN: Kiss-me-quick)
One of the most attractive of cornfield annuals, with purple flowers which are folded or furled like a flag before they open. Once it was abundant enough to be regarded as a menace, because it made bread bitter-tasting and possibly even poisonous. Cleaner seed corn and modern herbicides have virtually eliminated it from the fields, and these days it is seen only occasionally when old pastureland is ploughed or when it has been deliberately sown in 'wildflower gardens' e.g. in Earlham churchyard, Norwich.
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A packet was given away free on the cover of my Amateur Gardening a couple of weeks ago!
Pat
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So, if you are barmy enough to eat a packet of the seeds, you may get a slight stomach ache and feel a bit indisposed?
God how terrifying. None of us are doomed!
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Tue 26 Aug 14 at 15:19
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A slight stomach ache and, allegedly, death of course.
Naughty Girl Guides.
www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wiltshire-28935799
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So whats next, chop down all the weeping willows just in case? Burn the deadly night shade? Agent Orange on the stinging nettles? We could repatriate all the thistles north of the border post Scottish Independence.
Ridiculous, people who write and complain about this stuff should be forced to live in a country where all the flora and fauna (and even the climate) is out to kill you, not a safe benign place like the UK.
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Agreed. I understand that not only does Australia have some sort of poisonous mollusc that lives in a shell on the beach, the damned things actually chase you into the bargain.
Last edited by: Crankcase on Tue 26 Aug 14 at 15:39
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>> A slight stomach ache and, allegedly, death of course.
>>
>
Reminds me of the Private Eye "A doctor writes".
One began, " I am often asked, as a doctor, are postage stamps dangerous?
The answer is of course, yes. Licking postage stamps causes a rash, convulsions, and ultimately death."
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BBC spread poisonous plants across the UK!!! - Zero
