Lamium purpureum

Family: Lamiaceae

  In Gerês you can easily feel the thrill for adventure but if you pause a little you can see its humble rural side. The purple dead-nettle is not as scary as its name suggests. The name serves to differentiate it from the stinging nettle: “A dead nettle doesn’t sting”. It thrives the most in rural environments.

  Not many people know this, but young dead-nettles are edible (the leaves and flowers), although not particularly tasty. 

Crocus carpetanus

Family: Iridaceae

February
 It’s cold in Gerês, it is still winter. Things are only slowly starting to warm and you see this tiny, delicate violet flower.

This is one of the first flowers to bloom in the year, just before the spring, sometimes even emerging from the defrosting ice. It was seen by ancient people as the announcement of Spring. It survives the winter as an undersoil bulb (like onions) losing its aerial parts.

 It grows in altitude on sunny hills and cultivated terrains and it continues to bloom in March and April.
 The strategy of such an early blossom is to avoid the intense competition with other vegetation in the Spring.

Curiosities: The name carpetanus stands for its presence in the Carpetanian mountains in Spain, home to the ancient Carpetani people which where conquered by the Romans.