All sorts of Trillium fit in well with Meconopsis. I have two really nice dwarf forms of the species Trillium  rivale which form a really nice edging. It is very long lived and gradually spreads to form  good clumps which can be divided. I also have a very nice pink form of this. These two plants do occasionally set seed. 

Many Meconopsis are now well passed their  best in flower but are beginning to produce healthy looking seed pods. These need carefully labelling so that seed for the various exchanges is correctly named. 

The image here has nothing to do with this but once again shows the value of only ever top dressing with leaf mould and not turning the soil over since orchids then develope from seed under ground before flowering after a few years . This nice, very pale group most likely has either the white hybrid Gerry Munday or the white species Dactylorhiza o'kellyi as one parent. 

I have large clumps of various species of Cypripedium in among the Meconopsis. These were always bought as small plants and over the years can form magnificent clumps but it is a slow process. Many of the Dactylorhiza orchids do grow from seed in the garden in association with micorhiza and usually flowers appear after three or four years underground as a single large flower spike. This image is of the native slipper orchid Cypripedium calceolus which was dug up from the wild until only a handful of plants survived. Things have changed now. Orchid seeds  do not carry food reserves but in the case of the lovely species of Cypripediums people have learnt how to grow them in tissue culture or from seeds in culture. They are therefore now widely available though no doubt expensive. 

I FEAR I COULD NOT RESIST THIS. ROAD WIDENING OPPOSITE THE HOUSE. BARE SOIL JUST LEFT UNTOUCHED SINCE THE SPRING. A LOVELY SIGHT OF THE WILD RED POPPY BUT WHERE DO THE SEEDS COME FROM ?!.THIS IS LIKE WHAT USED TO BE KNOWN AS MECONOPSIS CAMBICA (the welsh poppy) THEY MUST SURVIVE FOR MANY YEARS AS DORMANT SEEDS AND THEN GERMINATE WHEN THE SOIL IS DISTURBED. PS Sorry I forgot the picture when I made this post.

One of the advantages of writing about Meconopsis in this way is that one makes contact with people. This is a quite exquisite form of Meconopsis betonicifolia (or baileyi if you accept the current split). I planted these seedlings in my daughter in Cumbria's garden where meconopsis thrive. There are 4 plants and all are of this beautiful pastel pale blue. They are throwing side shoots so they should be perennial. These seeds were sent to me by Svetlana from Russia and they are a wonderful addition to my collections. 

In north Caithness I have large planting of various big blue poppies for seed. This is a varition on the tetraploid Lingholm. Blues in Meconopsis can vary from year to year and I suspect temperature is involved. In the north we have had a long cold spring and so far only two pleasantly warm days of summer!

Nothing what so ever to do with Meconopsis! Many years ago one of my daughters was working in New Zealand and as always was asked to bring me back interesting seed. It has taken all these years to grow into a tree and flower. It is the Kowhai tree. This is a native legume Sophora tetaptera - the large leaved kowhai. This genus has the reputation in the United Kingdom of not being fully hardy especially when young. It has thrived in our garden near the sea on the east coast of Scotland and the flowers up to 6 cms. long are most spectacular.