Digitalis..........

.............better known as the common garden Fox Glove - this is the one that didn't get broken by my neighbour! (have put a frame round my picture for a change!)

I really like them and let them run to seed each year - they are really biennials - (seed sown year 1 - produces flowers year 2) -but I have found that if you cut them down before the seedheads ripen, the plant may well come back a third time. If some of them self seed, I leave them where they have grown - that's a good thing about cottage gardens, nothing is ever really in the wrong place.

BOUI for today do of course concern Fox Gloves:-

1) There are a whole host of common names that reflect the association with fairies Fairy Caps, Fairy Gloves, Fairy Thimbles, Fairy Herb, Fairybells, Fairy-fingers, Goblin Gloves, Fairy Petticoats, Fairyweed.

2) The names Flopdock, Floppydock, Flop-a-Dock, Flapdock, Popdock, Flop-poppy, Flop-top, Cowflop, Gooseflops, Rabbit’s Flowers or Bunny Rabbits all allude to the foxglove’s large soft furry leaves.

3) One story has it that fairies secrete themselves inside the flowers, and make a snapping sound when children, holding one end of the flower bell, suddenly strike the other end on their hand to hear the clap of fairy thunder, with which the disturbed and indignant fairy makes her escape from her retreat.

4) Another legend explains why foxgloves bend and sway so gracefully. It has nothing to do with the wind, but that as the flower is sacred to the fairies, it has the power of recognising them, and indeed all spiritual beings who pass by, and that it bows in deference to them as they waft along.

The weather is a bit brighter this morning thank goodness though not really sunny - just threatening to be! - Temperature at 57 Deg.F and very little wind.

Have a nice day!