MY MOTHER looked out her front window recently at a woman who had stopped her car to admire a trailing blue flowering plant that cascaded over my mother’s front wall.
Only she wasn’t admiring she was stealing, and not just a slip. With a few deft jerks of her trowel – premeditated or what? – she scooped out the entire plant, shoved it in her boot and made off while my mother stood slack-jawed.
If she had taken the car my mother would have been less aghast. I mean, a fellow gardener?
Up until then she simply would not have believed one could be both green-fingered and light-fingered.
The incident came to mind on discovering that Blarney Castle in Co Cork has the perfect antidote to plant thieves – a poison garden.
A recent addition to the castle, which is famous for its Blarney Stone, it has signs indicating that the garden must be entered at the visitor’s own risk. This is because the plants in it are so toxic they have to be kept in cages.
The collection contains plants from around the world, many of which will be familiar to Agatha Christie fans, including wolfsbane, deadly nightshade, mandrake and ricin, just a few grains of which can kill.
Some of the plants must be grown under special licence, such as opium and cannabis. There’s also poison ivy, contact with which can cause horrendous irritation to the skin.
I’m not suggesting that stealing other people’s plants should be punishable by death, or even dermatitis. I can’t help wondering, however, if those cages might be a good idea.