Birdeye Speedwell

The first speedwell of the year is always Birdeye Speedwell (Veronica persica) and generally it is also the last, because it flowers all year round if it is not too dry and not too cold.

It covers the soil in cultivated fields, gardens, meadows, and you can find it also on a walking path not too much walked on, like here.Nearly all Speedwells are blue, but this one is of a really good blue. The flowers don't stay long on the plant and are immediately replaced by new flowers.




A ray of sunshine and the colours come out. Just what you need in this grey season.

Holly

Christmas is over and there are not many branches with red berries from Holly (Ilex aquifolium) left. This is not because they all were picked to decorate homes for the holidays, it is because the birds have eaten them all by now.

Holly is a bush, sometimes a small tree, with prickly leaves that are green all year round. It grows in the shade of bigger deciduois trees, by preference Beeches.

Because there are not that many Beeches in Dordogne, it has to settle for other species like Sweet Chestnuts ore sometimes Hornbeams or Oaks. It does not like alkaline soils but prefers a more acidic substrate.

On big specimens you can see a design of small triangles on the bark of the trunk.

Here it grows together with another prickly bush, Butcher's Broom (Ruscus aculeatus) that, by the way, also has red berries in winter. Very small flower buds begin to develop on the branches, but to see the small white flowers you have to wait until May.