Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
days or nights you may see or feel them sweating away surplus saltwater from their
foliage. Sand dunes also provide shelter for a variety of colourful small plants as well as
giant reed or calamus , a bamboo-like grass reaching up to 6m in height and often cut
for use as canes. It frequently grows in company with the shrubby, pink- or white-
flowered and highly poisonous oleander .
Meadow and hill plants
Arable fields can be rich with colourful weeds: scarlet poppies, blue bugloss, yellow or
white daisies, wild peas, gladioli, tulips and grape hyacinths. Small, unploughed
meadows may be equally colourful, with slower-growing plants such as orchids in
extraordinary quantities.
The rocky earth makes cultivation on some hillsides difficult and impractical.
Agriculture is often abandoned and areas regenerate to a rich mixture of shrubs and
perennials - known as garigue . With time, a few good wet winters, and in the absence
of grazing, some shrubs will develop into small trees, intermixed with tough climbers
- the much denser maquis vegetation. The colour yellow often predominates in early
spring, with brooms, gorse, Jerusalem sage and giant fennel followed by the blues, pinks
and purples of bee-pollinated plants. An abundance of the pink and white of Cistus
rockroses is usually indicative of an earlier fire, since they are primary recolonizers. A
third vegetation type is phrygana - smaller, frequently aromatic or spiny shrubs, often
with a narrow strip of bare ground between each hedgehog-like bush. Many aromatic
herbs such as lavender, rosemary, savory, sage and thyme are native to these areas.
Orchids
Nearly 190 species of orchid are believed to occur in Greece; their complexity blurs
species' boundaries and keeps botanists in a state of taxonomic flux. In particular, the
Ophrys bee and spider orchids have adapted themselves, through subtleties of lip
colour and false scents, to seduce small male wasps. These insects mistake the flowers
for a potential mate, and unintentionally assist the plant's pollination. Though all
species are officially protected, many are still picked.
High-altitude plants
he higher mountains of Greece have winter snow cover, and cooler weather for much of
the year, so flowering is consequently later than at lower altitudes. The limestone peaks of
the mainland, and of islands such as Corfu, Kefaloniá, Crete, Rhodes, Sámos and
Samothráki, hold rich collections of attractive rock plants , flowers whose nearest relatives
may be from the Balkan Alps or from the Turkish mountains. Gorges are another
spectacular habitat, particularly rich in Crete. Their inaccessible cliffs act as refuges for
plants that cannot survive the grazing, competition or more extreme climates of open
areas. Many of Greece's endemic plants are confined to cliffs, gorges or mountains.
Much of the surviving original woodland is in mountain areas. In the south it
includes cypress: native to the south and east Aegean. The cooler shade of woodland
provides a haven for plants that cannot survive full exposure to the Greek summer,
including peonies and numerous ferns.
With altitude, the forest thins out to scattered individual conifers and kermes oak,
before finally reaching a limit at around 1500 - 2000m on the mainland - much lower
on the islands. Above this tree line are summer meadows , and then bare rock. If not
severely grazed, these habitats are home to many low-growing, gnarled, but often
splendidly floriferous plants.
Birds
Migratory species that have wintered in East Africa move north, through the eastern
Mediterranean, from around mid-March to mid-May . Some stop in Greece to breed;
 
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