Flowers are not only beautiful and fragrant, they’re also fascinating. The Arrange Floral Design ladies are a little flower-obsessed, so we put together a list of our seven favourite fascinating floral facts. You won’t look at your floral bouquet the same after reading this!
- Roses are a fruit
Ever seen a recipe calling for rosehip or rosewater? Roses are indeed edible, the reason being that they are actually a member of the fruit family, related to summer favourites like raspberries, cherries, peaches and plums.
- Tulips bulbs can be eaten
Tulips are another edible flower. While their petals can be used to decorate salads, more surprisingly, their bulbs can be used in place of onions!
- Tulips as gold
Staying on the tulips theme: centuries ago in Holland, tulips were more valuable than gold. Their presence and significance is still pervasive in the country today, though their value dipped below gold long ago.
- Daffodils as currency for the Royals
Have you heard of “peppercorn” rent, when the land owner asks for a small token rental fee? Dubbed the “daffodil rent”, Prince Charles only wants one daffodil every year as rent to those using his land on a historic site in Cornwall. We’d certainly be willing to pay in flowers for a piece of royal history!
- Sunflowers to counter contamination
Sunflowers are magical. Not only do they brighten your day, grow as tall as the sky and open daily with the sun, they can also get rid of radioactivity by drawing it out of water. Because of this mystical ability, sunflowers are used to clean water contamination after radioactive disasters like Chernobyl.
- Dandelions the health-food
You may know them as an annoying household weed, but dandelions are incredibly healthy. Edible from the root to the flower, the humbled dandelion is chock full of nutrients like iron, vitamin A and vitamin C. Their health benefits are becoming recognised with dandelion tea popping up on health food store shelves.
- Hundreds of thousands of flower species
How many flowers can you name? A handful? A couple hundred? Whatever the number, there’s room for improvement as the latest estimate puts the number of flower species at around 400,000!