Unappreciated national emblem

We had visitors this morning for coffee and sat out in the warm sunshine in the back yard – this summer is such a joy! It was the first time they’d been here since we had acquired the old field and their first opportunity to see what we had taken on. They were suitably impressed, if overawed by the task! This afternoon we went back to work there, tackling yet more weeds. The thistles are beginning to flower and, attractive though they are, they are devils to deal with. You can pull them straight out of the ground with relative ease, but you leave behind a horizontal root system that quickly regenerates. So, is it better to dig them up? Well, you need to dig deep and wide and very carefully. The roots are soft and snap at the least disturbance. If the ground is the slightest bit hard, all you’ll see is the broken end disappearing into the lump, which then needs to be prised open carefully to extract the menace. Oh why is such a plant our national emblem?

According to Wikipedia the origin is derived from a legend: “an invading Norse army was attempting to sneak up at night upon a Scottish army's encampment. During this operation one barefoot Norseman had the misfortune to step upon a thistle, causing him to cry out in pain, thus alerting Scots to the presence of the Norse invaders.” A fine tale – not sure how much we appreciate them in our garden!