The border
war 31st
April 2013
The daffodils were to
blame – they started it when the spring sun started to warm the soil surface.
The advance guard speared their swords up through the frozen soil until they cracked
their way through to the surface. More sap was pumped up from the succulent
bulbs below as the roots sought out nourishment from within the warming soil
The coy, gentle seeming, primroses used the soil cracks opened
by the daffodils to push their furled leaves through the surface where they
spread out and colonised what they thought was their rightful territory,
regardless of other’s points of view. They were here first so it was their
right. Nobody was going to stop them. The pansy shock troops quickly followed.
The fey wood sorrel apologised as it sprouted gently through
the top soils and started establishing its racing-green carpet under the shade
provided by the daffodils.
This was shortly followed by the garlic which stopped for no
flower. Everyone in its path was breathed on and made reluctantly to clear the
way for everyone’s unfavourite bed partner. Its bulbs expanded below ground and
squirted juices upwards to support the growth of the fleshy leaves and budding
white flowers.
Cowslips started their superfast growth, two inches a day in
ideal conditions.
The clematis raced up the south facing wall – the fastest
grower of them all as it grasped and clung on to anything to help it pull
itself up, itself if necessary.
The Spanish invaders had driven out the native English
bluebells. They were more aggressive but did not have that wonderful depth of
colour that characterised their English cousins. The tough, wide stems carried
aloft the engorged flower buds, ready to burst open to expose the pale blue
bells, and the odd white mutation.
Battle was joined underground as the sub aerial flowers
demanded reinforcements and supplies from the support systems below. Roots
thrust into dark corners seeking nitrates, phosphates and moisture then pumped
them back to the bulbs and rhizome factories for processing into sugars. The
sugars were pushed up the stems to the growing tips and flowers with a fervent
osmotic urgency.
A snail yawned and
started sleepily climbing a montbretia stem, munching on the fresh green shoots
as it went, happily rasping away at the first of its five-a-day.
The underground fight for nutrients was coming to a close, the
successful battalions had established their territory. There was a little
juggling for elbow room between bulbs, roots and rhizomes but the war would be
won above soil level as a new front was opened to harvest the maximum amount of
sunlight. Leaves were spread and height was gained to shade out shorter plants.
The leafy factories started the complicated, two-stage process of producing
sugars from sunlight and carbon dioxide. The spreading leaves ensured that the
soil surface was now covered in vegetation so slugs could emerge to start their
damp, deadly depredations.
Spring had come to the herbaceous border. It was prepared and ready
to start the frantic fecundity of Summer
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