Mohn and its relatives

Mohn is my maiden name, therefore - and as a botanist and gardener - I have a special relationship to the family of Papaveraceae. Red wild poppies (Papaver rhoeas) have a surprising resilience. Seeds may lie dormant in the ground for years and only show life and come to flower when the earth is moved - when you turn over the soil in your garden, when fields are plowed or shaken up otherwise as on the killing fields of WWI. On November 11 I was in London visiting the Tower with the spectacular arrangement of 888246 ceramic poppies  to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of what the British call the Great War.
My favourite Mohn plant is Romneya coulteri, the Californian tree poppy, with huge white fluttery petals, and an egg yolk like center. A good example is growing in Regents Park, London, quite close to the entrance close to Regents College. In Germany they are terribly difficult to propagate and grow, I have had one in my previous garden on a southwest-facing completely dry wall in deep gravel with controlled watering. It grew well and flowered, but I could not take it with me; they don't like to be moved.
I have also grown the blue poppy from the Himalayas (Meconopsis spec.), that thrives so well in Scotland. In Germany most summers are too hot, they prefer a constant cool climate with light shade. Unfortunately, I am not the only one who likes them - the slugs in my garden seek them out as soon as leaves appear in spring so you have to be vigilant every single day to protect the defenseless little leaves as they appear.
Meconopsis cambrica (Welsh poppy) is an easy-going pretty plant that seeds freely and seeks out its own places where it will thrive. It lightens up any border or dark area beneath rhododendrons with its bright yellow and orange short-lived petals and grey-green dissected leaves.
Most Papaver are of therapeutic value -  alkaloids in the milky substance of near ripe seed pods and stems are used for narcotics, while the seeds themselves, which contain very little opiates, are used for baking and cooking. Papaver somniferum, the "sleep-carrying" opium poppy, will send you dreaming .... Mohn and its relatives