The flora of Périgord in South-West France is abundant and diverse. In this blog you can find, in pictures, brief encounters with several hundreds of wild flowers and plants as they grow here in French Perigord. Following the seasons other species are added. An index of scientific and English names you find below on the right.

Corine Oosterlee is a botanist and photographer and she offers guided Botanical Walks and other activities around plants and vegetation in nature in Perigord. Do you want to know more? On www.baladebotanique.fr you can find more information. For Corine's photography see www.corineoosterlee.com. Both websites also in English.

Enjoy!




September 16, 2014

Carline Thistle


In a dry calcareous meadow or an open space in an oak wood you can find a small thistle with candelabra-like branches.


It is the Carline Thistle (Carlina vulgaris.

Late in summer spider webs covered this meadow, also the Carline Thistle.



The thin leaves are prickly and are covered with white hairs. The flower heads with many tubular flowers are surrounded by pale yellow bracts, shimmering like fresh straw.


Even after flowering it is beautiful. Until far into winter the bracts are visible on the plant, so it looks like it keeps on flowering. During rain they close, and when it is dry again they open up, liberating the seeds with parachute-like plumes to disperse.