A plant to make a man as merry as a cricket

Allendale, Northumberland The melancholy thistle's heads are magenta shaving brushes lighted on by hoverflies and bees

The garden is all heat and light on this summer afternoon, pulsing and multilayered with insect sounds and constant movement.

Wild flowers jostle with the cultivated, in varieties chosen for their nectar and pollen. Bumblebees wiggle up into the blue throats of viper's bugloss, hoverflies taste scabious, dabbing with their tongues, soldier beetles clamber over wild carrot, bumping into each other before hurriedly parting.