GlacierHi
Can anyone tell me why a farmer would be growing a field of white poppies?
It was a lovely sight but what would the harvest be?
Annie


--
Ann Heanes
Finance Office
University of Reading
(0118 3787161)
*))) (((*

Ann Heanes wrote:
GlacierHi
Can anyone tell me why a farmer would be growing a field of white
poppies? It was a lovely sight but what would the harvest be?
Annie

Well, at Reading U you're in the best possible place in the country
to get the answer! It sounds like an opium poppy: I doubt if it's
grown for pharmaceuticals in this country, so my guess is that it's
being grown for the seed, for food, oil, or the garden trade.
Poppy-seed oil is used in painting and cosmetics. The actual seed of
British-grown poppies doesn't, I understand, contain much morphine:
that needs a warmer climate.

--
Mike.

Mike Lyle wrote:
Ann Heanes wrote:

GlacierHi
Can anyone tell me why a farmer would be growing a field of white
poppies? It was a lovely sight but what would the harvest be?
Annie


Well, at Reading U you're in the best possible place in the country
to get the answer! It sounds like an opium poppy: I doubt if it's
grown for pharmaceuticals in this country, so my guess is that it's
being grown for the seed, for food, oil, or the garden trade.
Poppy-seed oil is used in painting and cosmetics. The actual seed of
British-grown poppies doesn't, I understand, contain much morphine:
that needs a warmer climate.

I saw a news story last year where an English couple who'd retired to
Spain innocently grew a nice display of their favourite opium poppies in
their garden. Presumably the climate there *is* suitable for morphine
production because they got into some serious bother with the local
police - I dunno whether they were prosecuted in the end.

Glen Able wrote:
Mike Lyle wrote:
[...]
Poppy-seed oil is used in painting and cosmetics. The actual seed
of
British-grown poppies doesn't, I understand, contain much
morphine:
that needs a warmer climate.

I saw a news story last year where an English couple who'd retired
to
Spain innocently grew a nice display of their favourite opium
poppies
in their garden. Presumably the climate there *is* suitable for
morphine production because they got into some serious bother with
the local police - I dunno whether they were prosecuted in the end.

Yes, Spain is warm enough: I find there are cases referred to on the
Web. The seeds aren't the regular source of opium and its
derivatives, of course: I think the rule here is, as somebody's
mentioned already, that you're only in trouble if they find you've
scratched the immature seed-pods. I once knew somebody who said he'd
tried it in Britain, and that he had experienced a drug effect. Not a
good idea, though at that crude level maybe no worse than booze.

--
Mike.

The message
from Glen Able contains these words:

Mike Lyle wrote:
Ann Heanes wrote:

GlacierHi
Can anyone tell me why a farmer would be growing a field of white
poppies? It was a lovely sight but what would the harvest be?
Annie


Well, at Reading U you're in the best possible place in the country
to get the answer! It sounds like an opium poppy:

Aren't the flowers of opium poppy a dirty-pink colour? Or am I dazed
and confused ? :~}

Janet

Janet Baraclough wrote:
The message
from Glen Able contains these words:

Mike Lyle wrote:
Ann Heanes wrote:

GlacierHi
Can anyone tell me why a farmer would be growing a field of
white
poppies? It was a lovely sight but what would the harvest be?
Annie


Well, at Reading U you're in the best possible place in the
country
to get the answer! It sounds like an opium poppy:

Aren't the flowers of opium poppy a dirty-pink colour? Or am I
dazed and confused ? :~}

That's strong stuff you've got, Janet! Replying on nothing but beer,
I'll say opium poppy flowers vary a lot, even in the species: you do
get white ones. The uniform colour of those the OP saw is what
suggested a cultivar to me.

--
Mike.

On 24/6/05 21:04, in article , "Mike Lyle"
wrote:

Janet Baraclough wrote:
The message
from Glen Able contains these words:

Mike Lyle wrote:
Ann Heanes wrote:

GlacierHi
Can anyone tell me why a farmer would be growing a field of
white
poppies? It was a lovely sight but what would the harvest be?
Annie


Well, at Reading U you're in the best possible place in the
country
to get the answer! It sounds like an opium poppy:

Aren't the flowers of opium poppy a dirty-pink colour? Or am I
dazed and confused ? :~}

That's strong stuff you've got, Janet! Replying on nothing but beer,
I'll say opium poppy flowers vary a lot, even in the species: you do
get white ones. The uniform colour of those the OP saw is what
suggested a cultivar to me.

Coming back to this rather late - my step daughter drove up to Stonehenge
last night and said there was a huge field of white poppies, stretching as
far as the eye could see. None of us know why such a vast quantity of white
poppies is being grown but in that number, it must be as a crop, surely?
--
Sacha
www.hillhousenursery.co.uk
South Devon
(remove the weeds to email me)