Papaver White Swan has dreamy white to soft cream petals, feathered and finely frilled. I immediately think of the classic ballerina skirts from a production of Swan Lake I saw as a child. In the case of White Swan those petals form dense yet delicate pom-poms that float on impossibly slender stems. Like those ballerinas, they have a hidden strength that lets them sway in the breeze.
🌸 Flowering: summertime
📏 Height: to 90cm
🌿 Annual
💧 Drought tolerant once roots are established
Sow: in prepared ground where they are to flower, during March to June. Lightly rake to cover the seeds (it’s a bit like tickling them in). Germination usually takes about 3 weeks. Alternatively, you can sow August to October (protect these in colder and wetter places with cloches over the winter) to flower in the following late spring.
Grow: thin to 20-30cm apart so young plants have room to grow. Flowering is in the summer. Collect the pods when they have dried or leave some to self-seed.
Enjoy: I’m drawn to these because of the memory they trigger. Sometimes that’s reason enough to grow something.
🏡 In your garden
• Cottage and informal gardens
• Naturalistic planting such as meadows
• Gravel gardens and prairie planting
• Flower borders and beds
✂️ Cut flower
• Fresh vase life 2 to 3 days
• Cut in the cracking bud stage and sear the ends in boiling water for several seconds.
• The seed pods are decorative, fresh or dried.
🍴 Edible
• Only the fully dried mature seed is edible. When the pods are completely dry the seeds can be tipped out.
• Used in bread and cakes
• ‘White Swan’ is a specific cultivar of the breadseed poppy.
💡 Did you know?
• Moonflower is an old regional name for white poppies, recorded particularly in Somerset and Devon. It seems wonderfully suited to White Swan, with those pale petals catching the evening light.
⚠️ CAUTION
Only fully mature seed collected from completely dried pods is edible. The rest of the plant is harmful if eaten.
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