13
Smealy and Rigid Hornwort from Mountnessing —
to name but a few.
My plans for the rest of the plot were even
more ambitious. I divided it into several
beds and intended to recreate replicas of some
of my favourite Essex verges. One was going
to resemble a roadside award at Newman's End,
Sheering, with tangles of Wild Marjoram, Hairy
St. John's Wort, Restharrow, Hardhead and
Scabious intermingling in uncomplicated
harmony; another was to be a compilation of
two bridleways in the Molehi11/Bamber's Green
area with Yellow Wort, Common Centaury and Wild
Basil emerging through a sheet of Yellow
Rattle. As regards to seed, I did the
honourable thing and purchased most of it from
nurseries. This was duly sown in trays and
the seedlings carefully nurtured until large
enough to plant out in the garden. All that
was then required of me was to sit back and
await both the pleasures, and perhaps the
problems that might arise.
One such problem became apparent in June when I
had an eye level confrontation with a Corn
Cockle. Whenever I had seen them on the
continent they had reached no higher than my
knees; yet here they were, already at an
intimidating height and threatening to grow
even taller. Nor were they the only ones.
The Salad Burnet, that delicate plant of the
chalky boulder clay, had achieved the
dimensions of a gorse bush; Corn Marigolds
resembled huge, multi branched candelabras and
ths tangle of Red and White Campion, Cornflower
and Rosebay Willowherb was so tall and dense