File:Asarina procumbens slipper-shaped flower buds.jpg

English: Asarina procumbens: paired slipper-like flower buds borne at a leaf node.

Buds borne by member of a colony - or possibly single plant with multiple points of emergence - of A. procumbens growing out of church wall, Paxton, Scottish Borders. Asarina procumbens, the trailing snapdragon, is a protected wildflower native to the Pyrenees, which has nonetheless proved capable of thriving as an attractive weed in some harsh urban environments - notably in the Australian city of Melbourne. The specimen to which buds seen here belong has a cascade of growth trailing from a network of woody stems with roots deep in the crevices of the Berwickshire sandstone church wall. Smaller plants (or offshoots) are rooted/emerging at the juncture of wall and tarmac pavement (U.K. sense), sprawling over the tarmac and accumulating detritus around their sticky mats of foliage. The plant(s) was/were flowering profusely - much to the delight of the local bumblebees, who were burrowing deep into the pale snapdragon-like flowers, in search of nectar.

Several specimens of this plant are said to have been growing at this site for quite some time. Given the proximity of the extensive gardens of nearby Paxton House the species may represent either an escape or a deliberate introduction from that estate (around which the village grew).