Tuesday’s rain has brought our back lawn back to life but, before I cut it, I thought I’d take a closer look at some of the grasses and flowers.
Back Lawn Botany
Tag: Self-heal
Self-heal
3 p.m., 70°F, 22°C, 75% white cumulus, slight breeze: Where it grows on a well mown lawn, self-heal can put out tiny flower heads that stay low and escape the blades of the mower. My mother-in-law Betty objected to the self-heal dotted about her lawn. She said the little purple flower heads reminded her of pieces of ground beef sprinkled on a pizza. Amongst the tall grasses of my patch of meadow self-heal is growing to two feet, to the same height as the knapweed growing alongside it.
The same is true of the bird’s-foot trefoil which is scrambling amongst the grasses rather than forming a low cushion of brilliant yellow flower as it might on rabbit-nibbled turf.
A bumble bee with ‘fur’ that resembles a brown bear in moult visits one of the flowers.