Flowers Of The Farm By Arthur O. Cooke

Hi,

This is Aurora.

Get yourself comfortable.

And listen to Flowers of the Farm by Arthur O.

Cook.

I think that some of you have been with me at Willow Farm before today.

When we were there,

We went into the farmer's fields in early spring and saw the men and horses at work with plows and harrows.

A little later on,

We saw some of the crops sown,

Such as barley and turnips.

In summer,

We were in the hay and corn fields,

And later still,

We saw the ricks being made.

Today,

We are at Willow Farm again,

And I want to show you some of the flowers that grow there.

I do not mean those which Mrs.

Hammond,

The farmer's wife,

Grows in her garden,

Pretty as they are.

We will look rather at the wild flowers in the fields,

The hedges,

And by the roadside in the lane.

No one sows their seed,

Nor takes care of them in any way.

Yet they grow and blossom year after year,

And nearly all of them are beautiful.

Before we begin to look at them,

We must make sure that we quite understand just what a flower is.

Even those of you who live in large towns and have perhaps never been in the country see flowers of some sort,

I feel sure.

You see them in shop windows,

And they are also often sold in the streets.

You have seen wallflowers and daffodils in the spring,

Roses in the summer,

Violets in winter,

As well as other kinds.

You do not need to be told that these are flowers.

What about the grass on lawns?

Oh,

You say.

That is not a flower at all,

That is just grass.

Yes,

It is grass.

But the grass has a flower as well as a rose bush or a violet plant.

It is only because the grass is kept cut short that you do not see its flower on a lawn.

If grass is not cut or eaten by animals,

It grows tall in spring.

Then in May or June,

You would see the flowers on tall,

Straight stems which stand among the blades of grass.

Many of these grass flowers are very beautiful,

And we will look presently at some of them in one of the farmer's fields.

Perhaps some of you have gardens or grass plots at your own homes.

If you see some dandelions in the lawn or ground soul amongst the flowers or vegetables in the garden beds,

You say,

Those weeds must be pulled up.

You call the dandelion and the ground soul weeds,

But they have flowers all the same.

The dandelion is perhaps one of the most lovely yellow flowers that we have.

They are weeds certainly in your lawn or garden beds,

For they ought not to be there.

Weeds are plants in the wrong place.

By and by,

In the farmer's fields,

We shall see many pretty flowers which he calls weeds.

We speak of the nettle as a weed and do not usually admire it,

Yet the nettle has a flower,

As we shall see.

And what do you think of a tree having a flower?

That is perhaps a new idea to you.

Yet if you look at a horse chestnut tree in June,

You will see at once the large spikes of beautiful white flowers with which it is covered.

Apple trees have a beautiful pink or pink and white flower,

And the almond tree bears a lovely pink flower.

All the other trees have flowers too,

But they are often small.

The flowers of the oak and beech are small,

But,

Though you may not notice them,

They are on the tree each spring.

Almost all plants,

Including large trees,

Have flowers.

They are flowering plants.

Just a few plants have no flower.

Ferns have none.

Nor have the mosses and leachans which grow on walls and rocks and on the stems of trees.

Fungi too,

Such as the mushroom,

Have no flowers.

Nearly all other plants have flowers.

It is by the flower or blossom that a plant is reproduced.

After the flower has faded comes the fruit and seed.

The seed falls into the ground or is sown,

And from it springs another plant.

Without the flower there would be no seed.

You see that there are rather more flowers than you had thought.

Still,

While we are strolling in the fields and lanes at Willow Farm,

We shall look most at what are generally called flowers.

We shall look at comparatively small plants in which the flower or blossom is easily noticed because it is large,

Or bright colored,

Or sweet scented.

But while we are admiring a daisy or a dandelion in the spring,

We must not forget that the great oak tree above also has a flower of its own.

We must remember that the oak tree is also a flowering plant.

Outside the front door of Willow Farm is a broad curving gravel drive.

At the far end of which a white gate opens into the lane.

On one side of this drive is a narrow strip of ground planted with flowers and shrubs,

And close to the front door there is a patch of grass on which stands a large old mulberry tree.

On the other side of the drive is a lawn.

Beyond that are more flowers and then the vegetable garden.

Further on still is a little wood or coppice of nut bushes.

On this March morning we shall find some wild flowers in this little wood.

Between the vegetable garden and the wood is a low grassy bank.

It is bright today with yellow primroses.

The primrose always blossoms early here for the bank is sunny and sheltered from cold winds.

I dare say most of you have seen a primrose before today.

Each pale yellow blossom is made up of five petals which are joined together forming a tube or corolla.

The petals are notched or indented on the outer edge.

At the center of the blossom where the petals meet each petal is marked with a spot of darker yellow.

Each flower grows alone on a long slender stem.

At the top of the stem is a kind of green tube out of which the yellow blossom appears.

The primrose blossoms have a scent,

Not strong but very sweet and pleasant.

The leaves are called radical or root leaves.

They are so called because each leaf appears to grow direct from the root.

But the leaves really grow from a short stem at the top of the root.

A stem so short that it does not appear above the ground at all.

Among the bushes of the coppice itself we will notice the flowers which first catch our eye,

The pretty blossoms of the wood anemone.

The whole coppice is starred with the beautiful white flowers.

We pick one and see that it has six,

Petals you say.

No these are not petals for the anemone has none,

They are sepals.

The sepals of a plant generally enclose the blossom before it is opened and they are usually green.

In the anemone the petals are absent.

The sepals take their place and are white instead of green.

Their underside is often not pure white but is streaked with pale pink.

Several blossoms which we pick have six of these sepals.

That is the usual number but sometimes there are only five and sometimes more than six.

The blossoms of the anemone grow on longer and stronger stalks than those of the primrose and in between each stalk are three leaves.

These leaves grow round the stalk in a ring.

Each leaf is tripartite in three parts or divisions.

The edges of these divided leaves are deeply serrated.

Besides the three leaves on each flower stalk,

Similar leaves grow from the underground stems which creep along not far below the surface of the soil.

Such creeping underground stems are usually called rhizomes.

At the further side of the coppice,

Where a hedge separates it from the little meadow called homeclose,

Are sweet violets.

We catch their fragrant scent before we see them for the tiny flowers are half hidden among broad green leaves.

Each blossom has five petals of a dark purple color.

There are white sweet violets too but none are growing in our little wood today.

At the base of the blossom,

The part where it joins the stem,

One of the petals has a little spur which points back towards the stem.

The blossom is therefore said to be spurred.

We may presently see other plants with spurred flowers.

While we have been examining the flowers on the ground,

The nut bushes above our heads are waiting to remind us of what we said just now,

That trees also have flowers.

The flowers of the nut bush or hazel are easily seen for they appear before the leaves are open.

What we see today are often called catkins but the name which country children give them is lambs' tails.

It is a very good name too for they are more like the tail of some tiny lamb than anything else.

These catkins are yellowish white in color and soft and almost woolly to the touch.

They hang in clusters from the hazel twigs and in the strong March wind which blows today,

They shake and flutter like the tails of lambs at play.

Some of them leave a dusty powder on our fingers when we handle them.

That is the pollen of the flower.

It is not just where these yellow catkins are dancing on the twigs today that the hazelnuts will appear in autumn.

The nuts will grow on twigs where there are very small red flowers,

Something like tiny paint brushes.

These are the female flowers.

They will be fertilized by the yellow pollen of the catkins and will produce the nuts.

Behind the narrow strip of ground with flowers and shrubs on the other side of the drive there is a low stone wall.

A piece of the lawn on which the mulberry tree stands has been cut away and a flight of steps leads down to a little gate into the fold yard.

This wall between the garden and the fold yard is very old and rough,

Not like the smooth brick walls you see in towns.

The stones are of different shapes and sizes.

The mortar has fallen out of it in many places and here and there are holes and crevices,

Yet it is a very beautiful old wall.

For many things grow on it.

Mosses and grasses and other flowers too are there.

On this May morning we not only see but also smell one of the flowers which grow upon the wall.

It is the beautiful sweet-scented wall flower.

It grows here and there along the top of the wall and a few plants of it are even springing from the sides.

Some of the plants are quite large and their stems are tough.

These have grown here for a long time.

The wall flower is a perennial plant unless it is killed or torn up by the roots it will live and grow for many years.

Others are quite young and only a few inches high.

These have grown from seeds dropped last autumn by the older plants.

You very likely wonder how the wall flower or any other plant can grow upon the wall for there is no earth to be seen,

Nothing but stones and crumbling mortar.

But if we pull up one of the smaller plants we shall find earth clinging to its roots.

Dry dusty earth has been blown upon the wall by wind and has lodged in chinks and holes.

Dust and soil too were mixed with the mortar when the wall was made.

And dead leaves falling on it and decaying have produced a little more for decayed leaves make earth or soil.

Wall flowers and other plants which grow on walls and rocks find very little soil sufficient for their needs.

Most of the blossoms of the wall flowers upon this wall are of a golden yellow color and are very sweet.

Some of the blossoms are,

However,

A darker yellow than others and here and there are petals which are quite brown.

If we look at the garden behind us we shall see that Mrs.

Hammond has several beds of wall flower this year.

It is a flower of which she is very fond.

There are wall flowers of two different colors in her beds.

One kind has bright golden blossoms rather deeper in color than any of those upon the wall.

The other has flowers that are a rich dark brown.

These plants are sturdier and more bushy than those upon the wall and there are more flowers on each plant.

The flowers are finer too and have a stronger scent.

If Mrs.

Hammond had wished she could have sown seed to produce many different shades of brown and yellow wall flowers.

She might also have had a purple wall flower and even a wall flower of so pale a yellow as to be almost white.

If you and I were clever gardeners and had plenty of time and patience we could get purple or nearly white wall flowers from these yellow flowered plants upon the wall.

It would perhaps take us many years but we should succeed at last.

This is how we should set about it.

Suppose that we wished to have a wall flower nearly white.

We should look carefully along the wall in the spring when the blossoms are out until we found the very palest yellow blossom we could see.

We should mark that plant and when the flower was over and the seed was ripe we should collect the seed.

Among the plants grown from this seed we should choose again the plant that had the palest flowers and should save the seed from that.

We might have to go on doing this for 20 years or more but in time we should have a wall flower so pale as to be almost white.

Quite white.

We should never forget our wall flower for no pure white flower can be obtained from a yellow one.

However pale our wall flower might be there would still always be just a tinge of yellow or cream color in it.

If on the other hand we wanted a purple or a very dark brown wall flower we should save seed from those blossoms which were nearest to the color we wanted.

Dark brown or with a tinge of purple in them.

We should sow seed from the darkest blossoms again and again and at last we should get what we wish to have.

Besides choosing seed from the lightest or darkest blossoms we should tend our plants very carefully and well giving them plenty of good rich soil.

This would make them grow bushy and with many flowers as we see them in Mrs.

Hammond's garden beds.

But if the dark brown wall flowers were allowed to seed themselves,

That is were allowed to drop and sow their own seed year after year,

Do you know what would happen?

They would gradually revert or turn back to their original form and color.

The flowers would become mixed in color and less fine in size.

At last they would be simple wild flowers again.

In frame.

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Thanks for watching!