Pizza, Pasta, and Plants – Botanizing in Italy and Corsica (Part 2)

Tuesday September 1 – The Redneck Alps

For day two of field work, we headed north into the Apennine Mountains. We stopped for a supply of bottled water, now we had realized the extent of the heat and humidity we were facing. I am truly impressed with the cheese and meat section of the area supermarkets.

We reached this precursor of the Alps in just over 1.5 hours from our hotel. Water bottle fill-up sites were scattered along our route, where clean mountain water was available for homeowners to fill up their glass bottles. These sites were often home to Hart’s tongue fern, Asplenium scolopendrium, which hung from the steep cliffs, often growing alongside Cyclamen hederifolium.

Our next stop was just after the village of Matraia at 1180’ elevation, where we spotted what turned out to be a fern gold mine.  We first spotted a patch of southern maidenhair fern, Adiantum capillus-veneris. We have collected this circumboreal fern from around the world, and our quest to collect as many accessions as possible continues. Nearby were many patches of the small crevice fern, Asplenium trichomanes, along with a single clone that was truly enormous, unlike anything we’d ever seen.

The area was also filled with Hart’s tongue fern. This fern is typically found in cool summer regions, so finding it in hot, humid climate gives us great hope for plants that will thrive in those conditions.  Growing nearby was our first sighting of Pulmonaria vallarsae.   Sedum album and Selaginella denticulata also grew among the ferns. My collection of this selaginella from Crete didn’t survive, so I was thrilled to find this at a decent elevation.

We continued climbing the narrow, winding mountain roads until we reached 2840’.  He was our first sighting of the common annual, money plant, Lunaria annua, whose seedhead were particularly visible. The most exciting plant at this stop was Sycamore maple, Acer pseudoplatanus. We have found this fails to thrive in NC, due to our heat and humidity, but these genetics should be a game changer. This was our first sighting of another of the rock polypody fern, Polypodium cambricum, along with ubiquitous, fall-flowering woodland sage, Salvia glutinosa in full flower. Our only scarab beetle sighting would also occur here.

As we continued higher to 3000’, we found what at one time, must have been an experimental forest, which now boasted mature specimens of the US West Coast native Chamaecyparis lawsoniana, as well as non-native larch trees. The dominant conifer here was the native white fir, Abies alba, which had these been importable, we would have returned with seedlings, since this should certainly be adaptable to JLBG from this hot, humid site.  This was also the first and only time we’d encounter the spiny leguminous, evergreen shrub, gorse (Ulex europaeus)

By now, we were in need of food, more than additional plant discoveries, so we headed back down the mountain, to find a restaurant, which turned out to be a bit of a challenge, since there weren’t any sizeable towns within an hour.  Using our “trusted” Google Maps, we were soon 0 for 3, finding each potential dining option closed. Near one of the closed restaurants, we did, however, spot a picture-perfect specimen of the native adult ivy, Hedera helix. We finally hit the culinary jackpot with attempt number four, finding a packed roadside stand in the Il Botteghino region, at a tropical 480’ low elevation. What an absolute gem, we wish had been closer to our hotel. 

After lunch, we headed back higher into the mountains on a different route, into the Apuan Alps to the west, stopping first at 1280’ for our 11^th site of the trip.  Here we found our first plants of Hepatica nobilis, a plant that usually suffers in our heat and humidity, but such would certainly not be the case with plants from this site.  Here, we also started seeing more of the bear’s claw lenten rose, Helleborus foetidus.  The real surprise here was finding a large rock face, covered with the rare butterwort, Pinguicula mariae, which was just published in 2009.

The southern maidenhair (Adiantum capillus-veneris) fern here, seemed to be a dwarf form, unless the reduced size was simply environmental.  Growing nearby was also our first sighting of the tiny, rock garden-sized fern, Asplenium ruta-muraria. On the same rock face, was the dryland, crevice-loving Globularia incanescens, which we successfully cultivate at JLBG. Slightly higher on the bank were stunning 3’ tall specimens of Polystichum setiferum, a plant which also struggles at JLBG, due to our summer heat and humidity. That would certainly not be the case with these genetics.

Our 12^th site, and final stop for the day, was an abandoned marble quarry at 2490’ elevation. This fascinating, primarily flat site, was home to an array of dwarf willows and white-barked birches. It was hard to determine if the dwarf nature of the plants here was genetic, or simply due to the rocky, dry nature of the site.

One of the willows was Salix elaeagnos, which grows well at JLBG, but the birch, Betula pendula, typically doesn’t not tolerate heat and humidity. These birch genetics would be an amazing addition to hot, humid climates. A compact, natural bonsai form of Juniperus communis also grew among the birches and willows. The most enchanting rock garden plant at the site was one of the shrub mints, Satureja montana.  We  tried this from seed over 30 years ago, but the seed never geminated. We will certainly be trying it again, now that we’ve seen it in person.

As the day was drawing to a close, we headed back down to the mountain for a dinner rendevous with two of our English friends, who’d just arrived in town, Dr. John Grimshaw, editor of Trees and Shrubs On-line, and his partner, Alastair Gunn, head gardener for King Charles at Buckingham Palace.  John and Alastair would be accompanying us for the next few days as we continued to explore botanical sites in Italy.

One of many things I love about traveling in Italy for a botanical expedition, is that every hotel is equipped with a Botanically Important Dirt Extracting Tool, known by the acronym, BIDET. This amazing invention is ideal for bare rooting and washing plants, and by Italian law, all hotels in the country must be so equipped…how thoughtful.

Part 3 coming tomorrow!