The MGS Forum
Places to visit => Places to visit => Topic started by: Alisdair on January 05, 2012, 01:14:19 PM
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Here are a few more of the plants we saw on the MGS trip to SW Turkey, in April 2010.
Alkanna pamphylica, broader leaves than the more widespread A. tinctoria and the same intense blue flower colour:
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Anthemis rosea, a pretty little pink daisy quite widespread around the eastern Mediterranean which looked more like a short-lived perennial to me than an annual:
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Asphodeline brevicaulis, a bulb found also in other Asiatic countries at the east end of the Mediterranean – like the anthemis, obviously happy in areas that would dry out completely in summer:
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Astragalus lusitanicus, the eastern sub-species of a legume which is also found around the western end of the Mediterranean (where it is reported to give lambs fits):
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Cerasus prostrata (syn. Prunus prostratus), the creeping cherry, a pretty little very low-growing compact shrub which we found quite high in the Lycian mountains – do any forum members with high-altitude gardens grow it as a garden plant? I doubt if it would be happy at lower altitudes though it can clearly stand intense light. Its fruits are indeed cherries which are said to be edible if not exactly tasty:
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Daphne sericea, a small to medium shrub found also in other eastern Mediterranean countries. Very fragrant, and under southern sun quite neat and compact (as a garden plant in northern Europe it tends to be rather straggly):
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Echium plantagineum, purple viper’s bugloss, widespread in southern Europe where it does behave itself – it’s known as patterson’s curse where it’s been introduced to other parts of the world, where it has become a pernicious weed:
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Genista lydia, quite common as a (highly floriferous) garden plant – nice to see it here in the wild:
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Gladiolus anatolicus, rather a choice bulb, similar to G. byzantinus but perhaps even nicer:
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Wonderful to see more photos from Turkey, Alisdair, they bring back nice memories. I wondered about the Prunus prostrata as well, there is not much information on the internet, but Wikipedia says 'The plant's main use is as in ornamental gardening. It can be grafted to form a tree' which I take as an interpretation that it probably may be grown at lower altitudes as well, there can't be that many gardens at the same altitude as their normal habitat of 2000- 4000 m.
I have added some photos from this trip, see below.
There were many Ophrys spp. that were new to me, Zissis Antonopoulis helped me withe the identification.
I will never forget the field with Lathyrus belinensis, it is amazing to read that it was not described before 1987, this year I am going to try them in my own garden in Norway, they are for sale from a company I buy most of my seeds from in Sweden (Impecta).
Ranunculus argyreus was small, but the yellow flowers were striking
I got lost from the rest of the group when we were looking for Tulipa armena, but it was worth it, I found some very nice plants when I was wandering around on my own.
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Thanks for putting up those great pictures, Jorun; those Ophrys were terrific.
Here is a couple more pictures of that memorable Lathyrus belinensis, to give an idea of what it looked like in the mass - though as your photo shows it looks wonderful up close.
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Lovely photographs Alisdair and Jorun, they brought back some wonderful memories. Below is a photograph of one of the highlights of that trip for me. :)
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We were lucky to see the Paeonia mascula in full flower and right at the end of the trip. Just before it was these lovely clumps of Iris purpureobracteata.
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Thanks for adding the name of the paeony John - I wasn't sure which one it was hence the omission!
I agree the iris were pretty stunning too, growing up the bank to the side of the road they looked particularly impressive. :)
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The Paeonia and the Iris were on our last day staying at Finike. We were on the mountain above the town called Ernez Yayla, right by the med. but at an altitude of over 1400 m.
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Thanks for reminding us about that rare iris, John. The yellow-flowered form from further north in Turkey, is I think commercially available, but I don't think the blue-flowered form is - it was only described as a species 30 years ago.
I remember at the time Oron was rather doubtful about the identification, on the grounds that the inflated bracts should be not only conspicuous (as in the plants we saw) but also "almost entirely suffused with purple", as one description has it. But Chris Gardner, on the spot, transmitted a photo to his father-in-law the Turkish iris expert Prof. Adil Guner, who confirmed that it was indeed Iris purpureobracteata.
Judge for yourselves! Here are three more pictures, the first a closer view of one of the clumps, the second a blow-up from that picture which does show both a slight suffusion of purple in the bracts and the conspicuous darker veining in the flower itself (a mark of the species), and the third showing the habitat.
Certainly a lovely plant, we were lucky to see it.
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Some more of our Turkish delights:
Glaucium corniculatum, a spectacular horned poppy. Both it and its relative G. flavum are quite common around the Mediterranean – absolutely drought-hardy and happy in hot dry places as annuals or maybe short-lived perennials. Elsewhere its flowers are often redder in colour, but we really liked this fiery orange.
Muscari anatolicum, a Turkish endemic first described in 1994 – one of those small plants that you have to get really close to, to see how pretty it is.
Onosma frutescens, quite common around the eastern Mediterranean.
Orchis anatolica, often present in quite large numbers, the plants usually a foot or so apart from one another. The name is a bit misleading, as it's not confined to Anatolian Turkey but ranges through the eastern Mediterranean from Crete across to Iran.
Orchis coriophora, the bug orchid: we didn't see such crowds of this, which must be approaching the eastern edge of its mainly European distribution.
Orchis simia, named for the way the flowers look like little long-tailed monkeys, very widely spread in Europe and further east, though not that common.
Ornithogalum umbellatum, perhaps the commonest of all the Stars of Bethlehem, in Europe and beyond (it's become an invasive weed in parts of the US). I have no idea why it's apparently also been called Sleepy Dick or Nap at Noon as the flowers stay open all day, after opening in mid-morning – hence the rather more apt nick-name of 11 o'clock Lady.
Tulipa armena var. lycica: not one of the flowers I saw of this had escaped the attentions of small snails or slugs, this was one of the least afflicted. Flowering much more tightly down in its leaf cluster than the one in Jorun's picture, above.
Vinca herbacea: this very pale form of the periwinkle showed up much more strikingly as it sprawled through other low herbs than the usual blue flowers.
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I wasn't happy with the identification of the Glaucium as G. corniculatum and I now think that it was Glaucium grandiflorum. Any observations folks?
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Looks possible, John; I certainly don't know enough about the differences between the two to venture an opinion of my own!
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Oh its a bit of a messy one again!
The Plant List:
- Glaucium corniculatum (L.) Rudolph is a synonym of Glaucium corniculatum (L.) Curtis
- Glaucium corniculatum (L.) Curtis is accepted
- Glaucium corniculatum f. grandiflorum Kuntze is a synonym of Glaucium flavum Crantz
- Glaucium corniculatum var. grandiflorum (Boiss. & A.Huet) Kuntze is a synonym of Glaucium grandiflorum Boiss. & A.Huet
- Glaucium grandiflorum Boiss. & A.Huet is accepted
To differentiate, refer to:
- Glaucium corniculatum (L.) J.H.Rudolph
http://flora.huji.ac.il/browse.asp?action=specie&specie=GLACOR
- Glaucium grandiflorum Boiss. & A.Huet
http://flora.huji.ac.il/browse.asp?action=specie&specie=GLAGRA
...but they are very similar!
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The plants in Turkey look quite different to the plants that I know on Crete. The habitat is somewhat different as well! I would say they are different species, my opinion!
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Mike, I think your internet trawling makes it look a lot messier than it really is!
There's no current argument about the validity of the two species names, all we want is for someone who knows the two species well (Oron, where are you when we need you!?) to have a look at our photos...
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Meanwhile, though not a plant here's a pic of Jorun and others at Termessos on this trip. This was the nicest of the ruins that we visited and basically we had to ourselves. Needless to say by the time I got here we had to head back!
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I was among those having problems with finding the purple bracts typical of I. purpureobractea, but your photos were convincing, Alisdair. I had a closer look at my own photos, and I did find some with purple bracts, I believe it should be possible to see some of this in the second photo. Anyhow, they were spectacular plants, the first photo with our guide Chris gives you an idea how large they were, Chris is very tall.
The name Glaucium grandiflorum sounds reasonable to me, it is not described in any of the book I have, but they all say that G. corniculatum has smaller flowers than G. flavum, these were certainly not smaller.
Orchis sezikana was a nice little orchid which is a natural hybrid between O. anatolica and O. qudripunctata (having more than the four spots of O. quadripunctata, but fewer than those of O. anatolica)
I could not resist adding a small closeup of O. simia.
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some nice piccies cropping up on this topic!
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Lovely pictures, Jorun - as was the one John took of you!
(Am I right in a vague recollection of Vic Aspland declaiming half of a Greek tragedy in that magnificent Termessos amphitheatre? Or was it The Boy Who Stood on the Burning Deck?)
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The amphitheatre in Termessos was spectacular, the setting is as dramatic as it can possible be, about 1000 m above sea level. I remember the little concert given by Becky and Gareth, singing 'Oh, What a Beautiful Morning' or something like that, they are at at the bottom of the theatre in the photo, Vic is on his way down for his part of the show.
We have not seen much from Oron lately, but here he is catching an image of a nice clump of Orchis simia, competing with John and Jo.
We saw the orchid Limodorum abortivum several times, I thought the name ment that it had been used as a remedy to provoke abortion, but I was wrong; it refers to the leaves, which are not sufficiently able to produce chlorophyll and end up being reduced to scales (aborted development). The plant is dependant on a symbiotic relationship with fungi (Russula spp.). They have very large seeds, but the development is very slow, it takes up to 40 years before the plant is seen above ground.
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What a wonderfully characteristic picture of the three photographers, Jorun!
And thanks for putting me right about why Limodorum abortivum is called abortivum - I'd always assumed that it was because its flowers so rarely open. When I've seen it in Greece and France the flowers have almost always stayed closed, in fact I suspect the plant's a good deal more common than people realise, as usually the stems look like totally uninteresting dark leafless and flowerless bits of undergrowth poking up - easily not noticed unless you're actually looking out for them.
It sets seed quite happily without ever opening (the spurs carry nectar, and you do see ants crawling up the blind stems). Apparently it can even set seed on stems that stay completely underground.
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On the path up to the main ruins were quantities of what I have written down as Colutea melanocalyx.
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Also at Termessos was this lovely form of Hedera helix. Equal to many a cyclamen leaf.
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Lunch was a picnic taken near the entrance to the site.
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Is the tree in the picnic background Pistacia atlantica?
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Yes it is.
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Thanks for showing these photos, Alisdair and John. I enjoyed the very relaxed informal lunches on this trip.
Another photo of Colutea melanocalyx,this bush was a real beauty, something for the garden?