Red Poppies

Known by several forenames including Common, Field, Corn and Flanders - every November they are worn in Commonwealth countries in memory of those who fell during the Great War - the particular colour of this poppy is only rivaled, but not matched, by one other British flower... the Scarlet Pimpernel. My ”Familiar Wild Flowers” (F. Edward Hulme - Cassel & Co. 1906) relates the impact of its colouring by saying... ”Though the Marsh Marigold flower is a perfectly pure and brilliant yellow; the White Campion, a white of spotless purity; the Borage as deep and unsullied a blue as could possibly be met with or imagined - these colours, beautiful as they are, must yield in brilliant strength and intensity to the scarlet of the Poppy.”
I love them as they appear in early morning light, back-lit by the rising sun, damp with dew, fragile petals from the newly emerged flowers rising above the nodding heads of those about to cast off their protective sepals.

Red Poppies

Red Poppies are always a joy to see waving and bobbing about on a Summer breeze... these could almost be anywhere in the French countryside with fields and lanes throughout the land being bordered with swathes of this wild plants' bright, but delicately fragile, scarlet flowers.

Chestnut Horse - France

In the département of Indre, in central France, lies an area of more than a thousand lakes known as "la Brenne." All the lakes were man-made following natural flooding after clay extraction for building materials. However, this has resulted in a wonderful habitat for both wild animals and migratory birds. I have visited this local area many times but mainly to photograph the dozens of semi-wild horses which roam in herds of twenty to thirty or more. Because there is so much natural grassland to feed on, and the extent of the largely unfenced habitat, they rarely approach... but on that odd occasion I have been ready with my camera... and an apple from my pocket.