My beautiful red poppy

My beautiful red poppy
Shines brightly like a beacon,
A bee lands on it,
To enjoy the nectar.

A butterfly is flying nearby,
The wings are washed with dew,
And the shaggy bumblebee buzzes,
Drinks an intoxicating cocktail.

The red poppy is another flower from my childhood. I was born and raised in Kazakhstan. I've always been fascinated by the red fields of blooming poppies.

In the place where I lived, wild poppies grew on the hills; they began to bloom in May and we ran through the fields, picking flowers.

We had this game. We'd pick a flower bud and guess whether the flower inside was a hen, a cockerel, or a chick. We'd open the bud, and if the petals were red, it was a cockerel; if they were white, it was a hen; and if the flower was just beginning to form and was yellow, it was a chick.

We always had poppy seeds growing in our garden. Grandma grew them in a bed, collected the seeds, and baked a delicious poppy seed pie. Poppy seeds also grew in potatoes, and we (the kids) would sprinkle the seeds right into our mouths when the poppy heads ripened.

But one day, after a rain, large shoe prints appeared in the poppy bed, and cuts were made in the green poppy heads. Mom tore out the bushes and destroyed them, and we never planted poppies again, so as not to attract drug addicts.

I didn't grow poppies, but one day I saw red and orange poppies growing along the fence of a dacha, and I wanted to plant some too. The following spring, I sowed a mixture of the perennial oriental poppy "Padishah" and the annual peony poppy.

Oriental poppy perennial

Perennial poppy overwinters well, and the bushes grow quickly.

At the beginning of June, the poppy produces long, strong flower stalks with hairy buds and blooms beautifully with large red, pink, and white flowers.

The petals are also large, rounded, and delicate, with dark spots at the base. In the center of the flower are large, shaggy, black-purple stamens. The leaves are large, pinnately dissected, stiff, and prickly.

Poppies are not attacked by pests or diseases. They're no trouble at all; I do everything as usual—water them, fertilize them occasionally, and care for them as I do with any other flower. When the poppies have finished blooming, I cut back all the flower stalks and seed pods to leaf level. However, you can leave the seed pods for seed collection.

In autumn I cover the flower, adding humus, and sometimes I place branches from cut flowers on top.

In the spring, as soon as the snow melts, I cover the poppies with plastic or covering material. If I don't, the green leaves they emerge with after winter will freeze, as nighttime temperatures in March and even April can drop below freezing. But that's okay; as soon as warm weather arrives, new leaves will grow.

Annual peony poppies

I sow annual poppies directly into open ground in May, covering them with covering material and thinning out the dense seedlings. Annual poppies grow quickly. Their leaves are green with a bluish tint, and their flower stalks are tall and bear a single bud. The flowers are large and double, with delicate, silky petals in vibrant colors.

There are tall varieties—up to a meter tall—and short varieties, 40-50 cm. These are the poppies I grow at my dacha:

Last year I grew another type of poppy, it is somewhat similar to the field poppy.

I collected seeds from our yard and planted them at my dacha, in a completely unlikely spot, but it still bloomed and delighted me with its bright flowers. I stocked up on seeds and will sow this poppy again in the spring.