“If you reveal your secrets to the wind, you should not blame the wind for revealing them to the trees.” Kahlil Gilbran
Trees have always been my among my best friends, I love the feel of being near to them, their scent, their whispering, rustling of leaves, the first buds opening in spring, their beautiful and delicately fresh young green filtering the first rays of the warming sunshine. So much about trees talks to me and inspires me. But I also like to know their botanical names, their medicinal uses, and their importance in the landscape and to the earth. I’ve been taking photos of trees here on Gozo, but obviously I am not familiar with most of them. Some of the trees that came to my attention a lot here are the Olive and the Carob tree, two most lovely trees that produce health giving and delicious fruits. The Eucalyptus grows here too, I’m quite familiar with this tree as it grow in Ireland too. I know there is a lot more to learn and explore about trees on the Maltese islands, something to look forward to next winter.
I’m just going to add photos to my post as I am still working on identifying and looking up information on the tree in my pictures.
Foto above are a row of Aleppo Pine Pinus Halepensis (Siġra taż-Żnuber/Siġra tal-Prinjol)
Bark of above Aleppo Pine
More photos of the above Aleppo Pine.
Young shoots.
Strongly scented sticky resin, and some of the open cones to the right.
While on the island of Gozo I took notes of and enjoyed some of the trees unfamiliar to me. It is nice and interesting to find out what they are called and then to search on Google about their uses, growth, country of origin and so on, it keeps me quite busy at times. Then I will take many photos of all the different attributions, leaves, flowers, seeds, seed hulks, shoots, trunks etc. And of course I like to share this in my blog, my blog is after all a celebration of all that the earth so generously has to offer to us and to life itself. And so here goes, I hope you enjoy.
The Ombu tree, or to give it its proper name the Phytolacca dioica L. is an attractive tree. I found it growing in the area of Ghajnsielem along the main road. I was amazed to learn that this tree is actually an evergreen shrub that can become quite old and grow to look like a rather large tree. I became fascinated by the beautiful glossy dark green leaves, looking very healthy and growing very vigorously out of the trunk. Apparently the more you cut it, the more fiercely it grows. Its trunk is a soft spongy wood, the rings are loose and not at all like proper timber rings. It is resistant to fire and drought and this is due to its many trunks which store water very efficiently in its large base. Its sap is poisonous. The Ombu is a South American relative of the pokeweed (P. Americana) It is indigenous to Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay, there it grows easily in the wild, and it is there that it manages to survive on the pampas. Put to good use because of its large canopy it shelters both animals and humans alike, but is especially good for the many cattle and so it is of agricultural value.
The fruit
The leaves
The flower
One of the trunks
Showing not tree rings but more fibrous material
Cut through one of the side branches showing absence of tree-rings
Being a dioecious plant it produces male and female flowers on separate trees. The flowers are greenish white, little and many on one long spike. The fruit is green and is clustered in a bunch together, I see both flowers and fruits on the tree at this time (November). To date I have not myself seen the seeds but believe that they are brown, small and glossy. I shall be on the look out for them just to find out. I learnt that extracts of the Ombu have Antifungal potencies which would probably make it interesting to Naturopaths or to pharmaceuticals. Some of its uses are: • Fodder – leaves are used as fodder in time of drought. • Medicine – infusion of leaves has been used as a laxative, but don’t take my word for it please. • Hot drink – locally the leaves may be used as a hot drink. (I am not planning to try it out myself not being sure of what the result will be). • Soapy juice – containing salts of lime and potash. • Shade in regions where other trees won’t grow – in the pampas it is the only tree that will naturally grow and provide shelter. • Bonsais – something I did not know is that it is an ideal tree to grow as a bonsai, nice to know! • Dyes – juice extracted from the berries can be used as a source of dyes. • Berries – apparently the berries are eaten by birds as they are not affected by the toxin as the seeds contained within the berries passes through the bird intact. I also read that in South Africa Ombu is treated as an invasive plant, possible because it grows so rapidly. Here in Gozo there is more and more emphasis on the growing of indigenous trees and plants, and eradicating to an extent the growth of invasive plants and trees. This is, of course, a tendency all over Europe these days. I am not sure at which time the Ombu tree was introduced in the Maltese islands and why, I wonder if it was introduced because of the high temperatures in the summer months, the drought some years, and the lack of tree cover in general.
One of the beautiful and typical specimen of Phytolacca dioica L.
I hope you enjoyed this little bit of information on the beautiful and interesting Ombu tree which in fact is not a tree at all. I for one will enjoy twice as much when I am passing these trees in the knowledge of all its good uses. And finally what I would like to know but could not readily find an answer to is whether the water stored inside the Ombu tree’s large trunk can be used in case of water shortage by cattle or people, or is it already juice in which case it is toxic? I would say, it is juice and it is toxic so it cannot be used. If anyone can shed more light on this please do.
These are some of the images of my life in the past year, and I chose the colour blue because that seems to have figured a lot in my life the last twelve months. While choosing the photos out of my media library here at my WordPress.com I enjoyed wonderful memories of both beauty and joy, and would like to share this with all my friends.
Yesterday I took a look at some of the spiders which were hanging around the garden, seeing that the turn of the season is almost upon us and with the morning mists and the evening becoming cooler, the spiders seem to become much more noticeable. They immediately reminded me of ballerinas, especially the three first ones that I came across, they are garden spiders, Araneus diadematus, also called the Crowned Orb Weaver. You see those a lot around here, they are quite beautiful and have sometimes huge webs. They rarely enter the house. In autumn the gardens are full of them. I took the first three photos, of two different spiders just outside along the wall beside the rainwater barrel.
The fine slender spider is quite unfamiliar to me and I cannot locate it, I did not see it before in the garden either.
Here in between two leaves (the leaves looked as if they had been pulled together into some sort of hammock), there are two garden spiders, sleeping perhaps, not sure but they looked quite cosy in there. I’ll be keeping an eye out for other species with the autumn starting. We are still getting nice weather, perhaps we might even get an Indian summer. Schools have started and everyone is getting back into routine, we saw a great number of swallows gathering on a neighbour’s roof, another sign of the season’s changing and their farewell to our shores, and we ourselves are preparing for our journey to warmer climate too.
A happy Monday morning wishes to all, hope that your week has started well. My week could not have started any better when early on I woke up to glorious sunshine. I happen to glance out of the window to the front garden and the buddleia bush and there I saw the most beautiful butterflies, five different species. They were fluttering among the honeybees of which there were over half a dozen. I stood watching them for a long time and only then thought about taking some photos and I’m glad that I did because in a way I feel that I have captured their beauty to share with so many others, and that makes me happy!
What a beautiful time of the year it is!
This is a peacock butterfly, it is found all over Ireland. It hibernates during the winter. It’s got to be the most beautiful of the butterflies in Ireland.
This was amazing, so many species on the one flower spike, there is the red admiral, these feed on over-ripe fruit and also in particular you see them on the buddleia bush. There is also a painted lady and a small tortoise butterfly. Not to forget the lovely honeybee, it’s so nice to see many of these around isn’t it, knowing that they are on the decline.
Peacock butterfly
Painted Lady butterfly
After I had stood there for a long time watching them, there came a neighbour’s cat and she could think of nothing better to do but to try and catch the butterflies, she managed to get hold of one branch of flowers and destroyed that, but the butterflies were able to escape and of course, much as I love cats, she got chased away very quickly by me.
In the last few weeks we have been visiting some of my sisters and brothers, those that live close enough by, and of course it being summer, we naturally gravitate towards the gardens. This garden that I illustrate in my blog today is well established, it is one of the older ones in the family, my sister Brenda and her husband Shaun have created it over many years, it is a space full of the most beautiful shrubs and trees, flowers and ferns. From an almost forested area, where there used to be an ancient orchard, to a manicured lawn surrounded by interesting shrubs and beautiful mature trees. Her Japanese Dogwoods, Abutilons, and Azaleas’ and some more shrubs of which I do not recall the botanical name, are all fully in flower. The Hydrangeas are almost open, and the Laburnum is almost finished. This all creates a magnificent array of colours and textures, rich and summerly scented. A real summer feeling abounds. There is more, there is a rockery which is also a place for wild flowers to grow to feed the bees, and an area where my sister feeds her many wild birds, attracting a lovely variety including bull finches, jays, siskins, and even a sparrow hawk who sometimes comes to see if he can catch something for his lunch! I loved our garden visit at the height of summer, and I hope that you too will enjoy the photos of so much beauty.
Thanks to Brenda and Shaun for permission to use their garden in my blog.
Yes, thank you for the roses, the beautiful sweet scented wild Irish roses that have been planted along the road, the link road in Skibbereen. What a foresight the town-planners had when they decided on what to plant along this road, the shrubs too are interesting and lovely, but most of all I love this time of the year because of the luxurious roses, what a delight for the eye and much nourishment for the mind and soul. I went for a walk today along this road and back through North street, I found more roses along a stretch there too. Could not resist illustrating this blog entry with full sized photos (phone pics) just to feast our eyes on these roses. Please enjoy this blessing.
“And the shower of roses spun around me, inviting me to take part in their ever-present waltz.”
Gina Marinello-Sweeney
“It’s like living in a light bulb, with the leaves
Like filaments and the sky a shell of thin, transparent glass
Enclosing the late heaven of a summer day, a canopy
Of incandescent blue above the dappled sunlight golden on the grass.”
From John Koethe’s ‘Sally’s Hair’.
Breakfast under the Hawthorn tree is such a summery pleasure, birds singing in the trees all around us, what a beautiful start to the day.
Today I was inspired by the shadows of some trees along the road to town, what I saw reminded me of some of the impressionist painters like Claude Monet, Alfred Sisley, Paul Cezanne, and others, also more modern painters like Marc Hanson or Terri Ford. I have always loved the way these guys painted the shadows under the trees, and indeed I love walking under trees during sunny weather for the same reason, the sun playing among the leaves, the shadows in all shades of grey, the dappled sunlight interesting and playful. The shade under the trees giving perhaps cooling to an overheated brain.
How I wish I could paint these shadows, and that light.
Just when I thought that it could not get any better, and this while I was taking delight in the garden the day after we arrived home again in Ireland, mother nature has given me another two beautiful surprises, first I discovered that there were several patches of forget-me-nots flowering, their blue a delight to the eye, then I discovered that there are several lilies of the valley flowers almost opening, how truly magical! I had not known what to expect of the garden on our return, no sooner were we home than I went to inspect, and that’s when I found lots of surprises, vegetables wild and not so wild, and waiting for me to make soup of them, kale and leeks and other goodies, they were not ready when we left in March, but now they are just waiting to be made into delicious dishes. Herbs too are doing well and looking very lush, the lemon balm has never looked so good, rosemary, lavender, comfrey and others are all ready to be used. Then I saw that the cold frames looked a bit bulky, and checked it out, to my amazement there was one plant of lettuce which had grown to become a monstrosity, the leaves so huge that one leaf would do a whole meal 🙂 Not sure what happened there! Some grass had also grown large inside. Lots of work to be done that is for sure, but I already have helpers lined up, my grandchildren, one of them had a birthday today, she is now four, and she wants a wheelbarrow, she wants to do gardening, and no fear of that, because she is small she can fit into the cold frames easily so she can do the weeding in there if she likes, looking forward to that. Anyway we are back in West Cork, and we are now already fully occupied with our work here in garden and house. Plans have been made for later in the year when we will be returning to the island of Gozo where we spent a wonderful two months, a time that will stay with us for very long.
On the last lot of photos, some onions which I had left in the kitchen sprouted, and are now ready to plant out. Also I had some oca tubers in a pot and I found the shoots creeping through a hole in the lid and the whole pot filled with sprouts, how funny!
Bark of above Aleppo Pine
agoyvaerts 