A FIELD of poppies which has sprung up along a building site has formed an unintentional tribute to the Battle of the Somme.

Neighbour John Shaw had become frustrated as the land had become overgrown with weeds as work on the building site in Canada Way, Lower Wick, ground to a halt.

He decided to scatter handfuls of poppy seeds from packets handed out by the Royal British Legion over the piles of earth and is amazed at the results.

Mr Shaw believes it is a touching, if incidental, tribute almost 100 year after the start of the battle during which more than one million men were killed or wounded.

His grandfather Arthur Bradshaw fought in the Somme alongside the Sheffield City "Pals" battalion where he suffered life-changing injuries.

Planning permission was granted several years ago to build a bungalow on the strip of land but Mr Shaw said he had not seen the builder for "several months".

"It looks quite spectacular now the poppies are coming up.

"Everyone has been commenting on it and saying how nice it looks.

"Last year I got some poppies from the Royal British Legion and wild flowers seeds so I decided to throw them over the area.

"My grandfather fought in the Battle of the Somme, as did lots of others, so it is a fitting tribute but a bit of a coincidence."

His grandfather was in action when his company were crossing "no man's land" as an enemy shell exploded killing seven or eight and badly injuring Arthur.

"He crawled into a shell hole and found a wounded German soldier.

"Rather than try and kill each other, they helped each other out and dressed each others' wounds then went their separate ways."