Dandelions – all in eye of the beholder

Sir, – It is all very well for city-dwellers like Pat McLaughlin (“All hail the dandelion”, Letters, April 16th) to wax lyrical in making the case for the dandelion to replace the shamrock as our national " flower”.

But, leaving aside what St Patrick, our national saint, might well have to say about such an egregious deflowering, I would like to quote our uncrowned poet laureate Patrick Kavanagh’s put-down of the flower in question: “Dandelions showing their unloved heads to everyone”.

Beauty, like love, still dwells in the eye of the beholder. – Yours, etc,

DESMOND SWAN,