An English Spring…

… doesn’t usually include this much sunshine! I’m inclined to agree with a friend of mine who says that Mother Nature has decided to have Summer first this year.

One of the things I love about Springs in this country (not that I’ve experienced them in any other country yet) is that yellow is the predominent colour – Dandelions, Primroses, Daffodils, Narcissi, Crocus – they are all mostly yellow!
Yellow is a gorgeous, uplifting colour. It brightens the world around you with a beaming smile and you can’t help, but smile back.

However there is one yellow flower that appears in this country in it’s thousands. The bees adore it, you can hear their buzzy hums for miles when it’s in flower. Farmers carpet the landscape with this plant… and I loathe it.

By now you might have an inkling of what I am talking about, if you don’t then the picture above may have given the game away.

I.  Loathe. Oilseed. Rape.

Not because of the colour – I like that and I think the plant itself is rather pretty. Also anything that can make Bees and Butterflies happy is wonderful. I loathe it because it is such a popular crop in the UK.

Farmers have fields of the stuff that stretch as far as the eye can see, they have multiple fields of it sometimes and being a country-bred girl, I know why. It’s versatile, you get oil from it, but it also makes great cattle feed and the scent of an entire field is so strong that Bees will come from miles around to pollinate it.

But, I can’t go out in the garden! I go through so much anti-histamine when it’s in flower and I’m fed up with it… *sighs*

I wrote a poem about it the other day:

Carpets of Yellow,

Ripple in the Breeze,

Sunshine Golden,

Making me sneeze.

So do forgive me if I seem rather irritated – I can’t help it when my eyes are streaming and my nose is making a break for Barbados…