A case for the defence of three unpopular (or unfairly maligned?) denizens of our Scottish landscapes and gardens.

                    PLANT PARIAHS

Bandits! Outlaws! Outcasts!

Destroy them! Blitz them! Burn them!

Eradicate them from this green and pleasant land!

How sad to be the focus of such horticultural hate.

But the plant pariahs do have their admirers.

~

Giant hogweed, I like your pizzazz,

Waving your great umbelliferous heads

Above river banks and motorways.

You’re dandy for making peashooters.

If your sap stings, then Caveat puer!

~

Rhododendron ponticum, I wouldn’t swap you

For all your showy cultivated cousins. All right,

You’re a nineteenth-century Himalayan import

But took to Scotland like an energetic native.

Sea lochs and hillsides are blazoned

With your mauve in early summer.

~

Swashbuckling mavericks of the countryside,

You suit the kingdom of the awkward thistle.

                                                                         LD

         MOSS PROS

I don’t give a toss

That my lawn has turned to moss.

It’s as green as grass

And springy as you pass.

Also, grass grows like rhubarb in summer heat,

Which is a somewhat undesirable feat.

I haven’t tried moss out for croquet

But suspect it might be OK.

                                                        LD