A Tasmanian flower farmer has avoided being in hot water, after accidentally growing opium poppies for her customers.
Kate Dixon, who runs a commercial flower farm on a property outside of Hobart, this year planted a field of what she thought were pink poppy seeds.
However after reviewing some of her social media photos, officials from the state's environment department got in contact, reports the ABC.
"I had an unexpected call from the department saying they'd seen some of my photos on Instagram and suspected that they were restricted poppies that you need a licence to grow in Tasmania," she said.
An inspector from the Department of Natural Resources and Environment took samples of the blooms, with subsequent testing confirming she had inadvertently used two restricted species for her crop, Papaver somniferum and Papaver bracteatum.
Authorised farmers in Tasmania grow crops of these varieties on behalf of pharmaceutical companies, which extract chemicals to create medications like morphine and codeine.
A spokesperson for the Department said "when prohibited poppies have been found in a garden setting, in the first instance our preferred approach is generally education, awareness and to engage with the owner".
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