Poppies mean so much to our readers and you responded wonderfully to the Poppy Photo Contest announced in the July/August issue. We received 238 entries from across the country and it was Sharon Snider, a Legion member at Hugh Allan Branch in Port Dover, Ont., who took first place. Having just moved into a new house in nearby Delhi, she was surprised to find poppies growing there this spring and captured her winning shot (below).

Second-place winner Jeff Bentley travelled to Flanders, where John McCrae wrote his famous poem. Bentley took his winning photo (below) in 2007 in the trenches outside Ypres, Belgium. An associate member of Waterloo, Ont., Branch, Bentley is studying for a master’s degree at Wilfrid Laurier University.

Martin Fisher of Winnipeg is the third-place winner. His photo (below) was taken near Roussillon in southern France. Fisher says the poppy is “such a pretty flower, yet it is a solemn reminder of lives given for my freedom. I snapped this in the spring and paused to think of all the blood shed over such a beautiful part of the world.”

Thank you to all who shared their images with us.