Collecting horned poppy seeds on a shingle beach on the Norfolk coast yesterday, I was suddenly surrounded by birds, as a flock of snow buntings tumbled twittering from the sky onto the pebbles around me, and hopped about among the dry poppy-heads looking, like me, for some remaining seeds. Just as suddenly, they were gone, the flock rolling along the beach like a little bubbling cloud, each bird leaping over the one in front of it in their hurry to feed.
We have had amazing success propagating the horned poppy (glaucium flavum), a very rare and specialised wildflower which only grows on wild windy shingle beaches, expose to storms and wild weather. The seeds took about 6 months to germinate, but our patience was rewarded with fine, strong plants.
