Comfrey

Magical spirals

I didn’t realise until I started making high-resolution botanical photographs about seven years ago that comfrey flowers unfold in perfect spirals. While spirals are found everywhere in the natural world, I've never seen more perfect examples in a plant.

I love comfrey. Like so many common ‘weeds’, its virtues are many. It will sow itself freely, but is neither as invasive as lesser celandine or wild garlic, nor as difficult to remove from a location where it is not wanted as dandelion. It is equally happy in shade as in full sun, which is essential in my tiny garden, shaded on all four sides, and it is both drought and cold tolerant. The bees love it, and it is a natural compost accelerator.

It was traditionally used as a herbal medicine, but is now known to be hepatotoxic both orally and topically, and research into its efficacy has been of such low quality as to not be reliable.