Wood Spurge

Wood Spurge (Euphorbia amygdaloides) grows, not surprising, in woods and it starts flowering long before the tree leaves start growing.





Spurges, at least those growing in France, have some characteristics in common. If you break a stem or leaf, a white latex oozes. And most Sprurges have typical yellow-greenish flowering umbels.






Wood Spurge is not an exception.






Here a 'flower' in detail. Round petal-like structures form a kind of saucer under some unusual machinery. Those two green-yellow half-circles are not petals, Wood Spurge does not have them, but bracts. And the little red ball inside is a not yet ripe fruit. It carries still the rests of pistils, two green lines. Left and right of this fruit, under two half-moon shapes, new flowers begin to open. And those half-moons? They are nectariferous glands. On top of all of this there are some stamen with pollen.





The rather blue-green leaves sometimes tinged with red look like they belong to another species.





And when, at least, the trees start making new leaves, Wood Spurge does not stop immediately making flowers.

Judas Tree

On the Perigordean 'causses', the limestone slopes and hilltops coverend with stunted Pubescent Oak trees,, you can see now flashes of fluorescent pink. The Judas Tree (Cercis siliquastrum) is a medeiterranean bush or small tree that seems to thrive here. It comes from gardens and it does very well in nature without becoming invasive.





It is a leguminose species that flowers abundantly with little butterfly-loke flowers that grow on older branches and the treetrunk.





The new sprouts only have leaves. But how pretty they are!






A solitary fluorescent pink bud on a thick branch looks like an extraterrestrian.






In summer, the Judas Trees makes luminous red pods.






And its autumn colours are not bad at all.

So, we can be happy it wants to live here.

Vernal Sedge

The first Sedge that flowers in spring is already nearly done. The stamina of Vernal Sedge (Carex halleriana) got rid of their pollen and they are nearly dried out by now; the stems that carried flowers now look like little brown clubs.





Vernal Sedge is a species from limestone soils and it likes dry and sunny spots.





It has two kinds of flowering stems. The larger ones have male flowers and sometimes some small ears with female flowers.






Below, more or less hidden between the leaves, are some female ears with white pistils on very thin stalks.






The dry grey leaves are from last year.