SPRING!

  Here you go. Spring starts today. We've been seeing many flowers and blossoming life already, but today it's official! This is, in my opinion, the best time to visit Gerês. The lizards are crawling out of their hidings, their small hatchlings doing so for the first times in their lives. The Amphibians are now very aroused, being on their reproductive season, since its warm but there's still a lot of water for them.

Salix atrocinerea

Detail of a flower and

young leaves

Family: Salicaceae

  In winters end, the Rusty Sallow is the first deciduous tree to paint the landscape in green. The flowers come first, with a tannish green colour. Then come the leaves, bearing a sharp light green.

  This sallow is a riparian tree, which means it can be found mostly in riverbeds and pools, being very important to stabilize the rivers and their margins. It is also normally one of the first species to colonize degraded or humanized habitats.  Needless to say, it provides food for a lot of insects that are eaten by larger animals.

  It contains salicine, which is the basic component for the aspirin. The salix bark was already used to deal with headaches before the pill was invented.

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. 

Ilex aquifolium

Family: Aquifoliaceae

  How well do you know this famous tree? Everyone associates the holly with Christmas. Why? 
The holly is a remnant of the Laurissilva, a sub-tropical type of Forest which used to cover Europe before the last glaciation. It evolved so well to resist the cold that we now link it to winter. It bears red fruits in November and December, being valuable and rare food for many wild animals.
This species has separated male and female individuals, so not every tree will have fruits (the males don’t produce fruits!)

   So, why is Holly associated with Christmas?

 It’s actually a very old tradition, older than Christianity. Pagan Europeans celebrated the winter solstice, viewed as the birth of summer (and not Christ!) since days start to grow from that date. Holly was a sacred plant for them, especially in the winter when almost every other plant seems to faint.  

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.