News
Our regular newsletters to members include articles on all aspects of gardening, information about past and forthcoming events and updates on the work of the SGT Council and committees. Members are invited to contribute relevant articles and/or photographs to the newsletters. See more news on our Instagram pages.
- Help Paint the Country Yellow
The Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) is asking for our help in mapping the UK’s daffodils and in tracking down three of the rarest varieties.
Celebrating 100 years since it played a crucial part in preserving this cheerful harbinger of Spring, the RHS has launched a Daffodil Diaries project running until St David’s Day, calling on us to record where we see the flowers and describing them. By entering our findings on its website, we will be helping the RHS understand the environmental influences on the plants and come up with ways of preserving this diversity for the future.
The RHS is also keen for us to look out for three varieties it fears might be disappearing -Sussex Bonfire, Mrs R O Backhouse and Mrs William Copeland. Pictures and descriptions of these can be found on the project pages of the website: https://www.rhs.org.uk/science/daffodil-diaries
With their sunny colours and nodding habits, daffodils are a sign that Spring is coming but they are not just a pretty face. Grown originally for medicinal uses, the plants are currently being harvested for their source of galantamine which is used to treat Alzheimer’s.
Daffodils originated from the Iberian Peninsula and north Africa and may have been brought to Britain by the Romans but certainly we have made them our own now as 90% of the world’s cut flower daffodils are grown here.