Cantabria Morning Glory

 

It is not any longer in flower now. On its branched stems only small fruits can be found.

 

 

But two months ago Cantabria Morning Glory (Convolvulus cantabrica) was in flower everywhere on dry stony limestone slopes.

 

This meadow is scattered with its pink flowers between the flowering ears of Somerset Hair-grass (Koeleria vallesiana) and other typical plants of this habitat. It was May, everything was still green, the plants did profit from the humidity of the early season to grow and flower.

 

Cantabria Morning Glory has pink pentagonal flowers on stalks more or less prostrate. In contrast with  other Morning Glories this one does not climb.

 

Its leaves are long and undulated and a bit downy. And the flowers close at night, early in the morning they are not yet open.

 

 

Yes!

Italian Lords-and-Ladies

Two months ago this bizarre flower could still be found everywhere in woodlands and under trees. Maybe the inflorescence of Italian Lords-and-Ladies (Arum italicum) is not especially beautiful, but it serves its purpose very well.

The spathe, this large whitish bract, contains in its inferior part minuscule flowers well hidden from view. Only a kind of yellow club is visible, it attracts tiny flies.

 

Those flies enter into the lower part of the spathe where they find odorousand  tasteful pollen-grains. That the smells are good may compensate for the fact that they are prisoners now, the entrance is blocked by reverse hairs so they can't climb out. Only after pollination those hairs dry out and the flies are free to leave and fly around in search of a new spathe-trap.

The result of this special trick:  berries. 

 

 

Now, in July, they are still green or just a bit orangy. The pale tuberous ring below them is the remnant of the spathe that has fallen off a few weeks ago.

 

Soon the berries will turn into a very attractive red. And as an extra, they are sweet! Take care, they are poisonous for us (but there are birds that can eat them without problems and sometimes also roe deer and small rodents).

 

Only at the end of winter and early spring the attractively white-veined and speckled leaves can be found; they disappear when the flower spathes come out. It is a perennial plant, an underground root system survives.

 

Italian Lords-and-Ladies leaves withoput spots also exist, they are small and belong to young plants of the year.