What is this, I asked a few blogs ago? Comfrey, said Matthew of Troyes House – and he absolutely right… Although it is more normal to see it as a mauve flower than a white one.
Symphytum officinale, according to Foraging and Wild, ‘a unique group of government accredited foragers’. They have lots of information about comfrey including that it is native to Europe, is a fast growing perennial, great for compost (both the leaves and a liquid feed made by soaking the leaves in water for a week), to eat (although in very small quantities as the leaves are very bitter), for making tea and for a whole range of herbal medicines. Comfrey is ‘also rated in fourth place for per day nectar production per flower in the UK’ – obviously a very good thing to have in your garden. Since I seem to have loads of them I need to get out there and start making liquid feed!
This may be especially relevant if not only we, but the garden centres remain in lock down for too long. This may be sad for us gardeners but is catastrophic for the garden centre/nursery sector. They are just approaching their busiest time of the year and their products do not keep! Sadly there is really nothing much we can do to help them – except buy as much as we can by mail order from those who manage to get some sort of mail order service up and running.
In purely personal terms that means that all of those pots I lugged up from Lawn Road with the rather passé remains of last summer’s flowers are now being lovingly tended and watered (and will be fertilised with comfrey…) as that might be all that I get this year!! Here is Tawny Pipit munching forget me nots beside one of them.
However, I am glad to say that the grasses that I so viciously hacked in half last weekend seem to bear me no grudge for their ill treatment and are already showing signs of new growth.
And… Sue’s primroses seem to have bedded in nicely.
And for those of you desperate for your daily dose of Hampstead Heath rather than my garden – here is the work of some of those tree trimmers that I saw going into Kenwood Park the other day.
If you would like to get a notification of each new post, please ‘subscribe’ in the box on the right. It is very easy to ‘unsubscribe’ you if you get bored! You will get an email asking you to confirm your subscription but if it does not appear, check your junk box as the emails are often seen as spam.
Wasn’t comfreys old name ” cure all” because of its healing benefits.. the ointment was great for burns and wounds if I remember rightly.
I think so – and I am pretty sure that you could also make splints for broken bones from a paste made out of the roots.
I heard that Nigel Clarke’s nursery in Guernsey has been closed…didn’t know that all of them in the UK were also closed. Here in California most nurseries also sell tools, and thus are deemed “essential,” and so are kept open. Lucky for us!
Owning and running a small nursery is a tough business, and all those lovely 6 packs of annuals etc. are indeed very perishable. I hate to think of how many nurseries will be put out of business by this.
I’d also add that gardening is good for the soul…for many of us, it is an important way to stay sane in these terrible tough times. Good luck to all.
Oh, of course – Nigel would have been closed down – I hadn’t thought – I will contact him. It is awful what will happen to the nurseries. It seesm that selling tools in your garden centre is not enough here to allow you to stay open. And when they are allowed to open again, will there be anything to buy?…. Some are doing mail order but it is hard with plants, especially delicate annuals.
And you are so right that gardening is food for teh soul – and there are a lot of souls in need of food right now!