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Friday 15th June 2012

Many, many years ago, the 'agony aunt' of a woman's magazine began her column with 'I'm sorry to return to premature ejaculation so soon but my postbag was absolutely full of it'.

I suppose returning to Heracleum mantegazzianum, giant hogweed, in just under a month counts as pretty soon but the truth is Edinburgh is absolutely full of it.

We had another trip to Edinburgh today and, although the weather was foul and the rain never let up, I couldn't resist stopping to get some more pictures of the giant hogweed I'd seen before.

It is beginning to get itself up to its full height.

And the foliage along the roadside is filling out, but I won't add 'nicely'.

In places the flowers are starting to form.

Interestingly, I read something, yesterday, about the flowers. A news report from Maine in the USA warned about the presence of giant hogweed but noted that many people were reporting sightings that turned out to be Heracleum sphondylium, cow parsnip, the confusion being realised if the plant was said to be in flower because cow parsnip flowers earlier than Heracleum mantegazzianum.

It is possible that some people might see these flowers of Anthriscus sylvestris, cow parsley, emerging from a patch of giant hogweed and assume it was the latter producing them.

But it is this picture that gives the clearest idea of how quickly this, and for that matter other, plants grow.

The crudely drawn red circle I've added to that picture is to draw attention to the 'Green Belt Improvement' sign I mentioned before. This picture, from that blog entry shows just how much the sign has become obscured.

Although I've photographed the same area on each of the three occasions I've blogged about it, I could, today, if the weather had been better, stopped in any one of a dozen other places and taken pictures of thriving giant hogweed plants.

I can't help thinking that one of two things will happen in the next couple of months. Either there will be lots of reports of people suffering burns from contact with these plants or there will be further evidence that, although we live our lives surrounded by potentially harmful plants, we mostly avoid the harm they could cause.

'Is That Cat Dead? - and other questions about poison plants' is now also available in Kindle form from Amazon.