Wednesday 17 September 2008

Amateur botanist

Now the morning walks are almost a habit, and I look forward to new routes. This morning I walked for the first time the "long" route; I added the whole 1.3 km running/ski track to my normal walk. This is the view from the highest hilltop to the South.





This time I concentrated on the berries. They look a lot nicer than most mushsrooms ;) ! This is the European blueberry, or bilberry (Vaccínium myrtillus), in autumn colours. The berry time was in July/August.




This is lingonberry thinking it is June, white flowers in September:



And here are the berries. I just found in the dictionary that the lingonberry is only the commercial name for the berries, and the Vaccínium vítis-idáea really is cowberry or mountain cranberry.



Here is Rúbus saxátilis, or roebuck berry or stone bramble. The berries are not edible.



This is Convallária majális, lily of the valley. The big beautiful berries are poisonous. I used to pick all the flowers from our yard when the children were little, but I also told them not to eat any berries from the nature without showing me first.



The last berry is a real bush, Ríbes alpínum, or alpine currant. The berries are red and tasteless.



I was so focused on the ground that I forgot to take a picture of yet another berry, Sórbus aucupária, the rowan tree. Yesterday, when I took another route (without the camera), I suddenly heard loud sounds of birds, fieldfares according to my dictionary. A noise in fact, they are no great singers. There were hundreds of them all over the rowan trees eating the red berries. The bird flocks move in the area eating every tree empty. Sometimes the Bohemian/northern waxwings find these berries in winter and they also come in big flocks to eat. They look and sound a lot nicer than the fieldfares, who ate all redcurrants from my garden in July.
Today I have my day off, and DH is away on a fair. I'm alone at home until the evening. I have great plans for the day and I hope to be able to show something hand made for a change in my next post!

5 comments:

  1. I like to follow your walks in the forrest, - it's so different from here where my close walks are by the sea.
    Happy walking!

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  2. Hi Ulla that is fascinating! I am still so curious about your unknown mushroom. I do love a good puzzle. :-)
    I have seen lingonberry jam (and eaten it) from Ikea but we just don't have it grow in the UK. I too am seeing a lot of Rowan berries this year. The farmers usually take a bumper crop of rowan in Autumn means a harsh Winter ahead. The leaf colours are beautiful for you already.
    Have a lovely craft day!

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  3. I'm so impressed you know the names of all the plants and berries. In my walks I just observe and know very little about the names of things. Thank you again for a wonderful tour.

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  4. Hallo
    How beatuful berries you have. I have been in New York for two weeks and have very fun.
    You can come in to my blogg.
    www.metrobloggen.se/RutViola

    ReplyDelete
  5. your walks are so interesting Ulla and the scenery is stunning.
    Have you had two e-mails off me? I featured you in my guest blog and sent you the link. If you didn't get them let me know and I will send the link again.

    ReplyDelete

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