Grow Opium Poppies

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"Here dear,” said the gray-haired woman as she pressed an envelope of seeds into my hand, “you’ll like these.” The neat script read “Giant Pink California Poppy”, and I stuffed the envelope hastily into my pocket as I shook hands and answered questions after a lecture.

That brief exchange nearly fifteen years ago was my introduction to the opium or breadseed poppy (Papaver somniferum), though I didn’t realize it at the time. I scattered the seed in early spring, expecting to see the ­finely divided leaves of California poppies emerge. Instead, tiny rosettes of fringed turquoise-gray foliage appeared. Intrigued, I watched the young plants as they grew like blue lettuce, quickly sending up erect stalks reaching nearly 3 feet high. “This is one helluva California poppy,” I marveled.

My anticipation swelled along with the pendant oval buds. Finally one morning, the pink petals broke free, the blossom swinging skyward as the sun baked its crinkled petals to a satin sheen. A muff of golden stamens encircled the pale green stigma. It was love at first sight.

Individual poppy flowers last only a day. Perhaps their fleeting nature adds to their allure. As the Scottish poet Robert Burns wrote:

But pleasures are like poppies spread, / You seize the flow’r, its bloom is shed; / Or like the snow falls in the river, / A moment white—then melts forever.

Plop a poppy anywhere

Opium poppie plants bloom in many shades and forms. The flowers may be white, pink, mauve, lavender, raspberry, maroon, red-orange or bicolored. A contrasting dark blotch at the base of each petal is a common feature. The simplest form is a four-petaled single. Occasionally these have fringed petal edges; the red-and-white ‘Danebrog’, or ‘Danish Flag’, has not only lacy edges but big white basal blotches.

Other varieties contain so many petals that the central stigma and stamens completely disappear beneath them. The ones that look like Hostess Snowballs (those bright pink ­coconut-covered snack cakes) are known as peony-flowered poppies. Some forms are cultivated for their extra-large seedpods, which flower arrangers find desirable. One of them, ‘Hen and Chicks’, has a central large pod surrounded by smaller satellite pods.

The sun-loving annuals germinate during cool weather, sometimes even in winter. They thrive in well-drained soil and tolerate a degree of drought but easily perish in waterlogged clay. Seedlings can be difficult to transplant, but some gardeners get good results by starting them in plug trays or six-pack cells.

Opium poppies start flowering in early summer here in Denver (ear­lier in the South, later in the North) and continue blooming for several weeks. After flowering, the plants quickly decline as the pods swell and the leaves wither. A few capsules may be left to self-sow (each contains hundreds of seeds); the remaining plants are easily pulled and composted.

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