Lavender

It’s lavender cutting season. Well, for me at least. It’s not a job I enjoy, cutting the flowers off of about 50 yards of lavender plants, but at least when it’s done, the garden looks a whole lot tidier.

I planted most of mine as quick-growing ground cover several years ago. It needs next to no water, produces masses of lilac/purple flower heads and attracts a multitude of bugs, bees and butterflies. Apparently, laid across a doorstep or a window sill, it also acts as a deterrent for the horrible scorpions which we get down here and which can give a nasty sting if encountered.

One of the side benefits of the lavender cutting season chez nous is that I smell gorgeous for a couple of days, even after I’ve been in the pool. The smell lingers on and on and is one of the reasons why its dried flowers are bagged and used for wardrobes and clothes drawers. You can even put some under your pillow and drift off to sleep in a lavender enthused stupor, although in my case it would probably just make me think of all the cutting I still have to do.

Of course, commercially, lavender is big business in the south and higher regions of France, with the flower heads mainly being distilled to produce a highly sought after oil which is used in a variety of ways from perfume making through to medicines and soap making. One ton of flower heads (and that is a lot of flowers!) produces anywhere between 5kg and 20kg of essence. Me – I just put them in my trailer and dump them at the tip, a rather unglorious end to a glorious growing season of vivid purple flowers. Maybe I should take them up to the perfume factory a couple of miles away and see if they’ll give me anything for them?

A bottle of after shave would suffice.