Mirken
“First cam the volcanic ash frae Eyjafjallajökull an oor een were mirken. Then the dust made oor kale an neeps grow muckle an noo they’re stingin an eatin us an wi canni see.”
Translated:
mirken: darken.
“First came the volcanic ash from Eyjafjallajökull and our eyes were darkened. Then the dust made our brassicas and turnips grow very large and now they’re stinging and eating us and we cannot see.”
![[mirken spelled out in the phonetic alphabet.]](../comics/phonetics/mirkenph.gif){kind=small}
The Day of the Triffids (1951) is a great read as is a Scent of New Mown Hay (1958) where it is a fungus that attacks humanity.
The plants here are based on Frank Oz’s the Little Shop of Horrors where Lyle Conway designed the plant puppets.
He also created many of the puppets for the films Dark Crystal.
I paricularly liked the Skeksis.
As far as unusual plant food goes, there are many firms selling volcanic rock dust as an additive for the garden.
It’ll be interesting to see if the free dusting that we are getting from Iceland makes any difference to our farms and hedgerows.
I’ll remember this next time I eat turnips!
When I was a kid, we had monsters in the wardrobe and they looked just like your triffids. Can you lend us a few to keep the neds out of our bus shelter?