Southern Greece and SW Turkey

[Kees Jan]

Can anyone help me with the correct name of this nice cushion plant photographed recently at about 1500 m near Mount Killini, northern Peloponnesos? I don't have a clue, not even of the right family...

[Kees Jan]

Here are two other plants form the slopes of Mount Killini, northern Peloponnesos.

Could the first one be Drypis spinosa?

Any suggestions for the name of the Clematis?

Does anyone know the name of the Crataegus that grows there? It's a wonderful shrub!

[Gerdk]

Can anyone help me with the correct name of this nice cushion plant photographed recently at about 1500 m near Mount Killini, northern Peloponnesos? I don't have a clue, not even of the right family...

Hi Kees Jan,
Just for keeping the discussion running (I hope this is a correct sentence):
What's about a Saponaria species?

Gerd

[Casalima]

An Androsace???

[Lesley Cox]

I don't think the top two are either a Saponaria or an Androsace. No real reason except a gut feeling. They just don't look "right."

[Carlo]

My initial reaction (quite knee-jerk) was Anchusa caespitosa....but mine is very different.

It really looks for all the world like a Delosperma (of all things...)

[Lesley Cox]

It does, doesn't it. Or juicy at least if not actually succulent. I keep thinking of our native Abrotonella, but how stupid is that?

[DaveM]

Hi Kees Jan

I'm afraid I can't help with the unknown cushion, but the 'Drypis' looks more like an Acantholimon to me. The common one in the area is A androsaceum.

Dave

[Lesley Cox]

I don't think Acantholimon either. The leaves are the spikes in that genus, while these look to have relatively painless leaves but savage spines.

[Kees Jan]

Many thanks to everyone for the suggestions , but to be honest, I don't think we've made much progress in identifying them. Identifying Greek alpines without flowers just isn't easy, is it.

The spiny plant is not an Acantholimon, and the other cushion plant is not Anchusa caespitosa since that is restricted to crete, and has much larger leaves. It does look a bit like an Androsace (a small carnea for instance), but I don't think there are any alpine Androsace in the Peloponnese either.

Here are two other fantastic cushion plants photographed on Mt. Killini. One of them is in the Caryophyllaceae family and makes cushions that can be more than 1 meter in diameter, the other one is a small alpine Astragalus. Can anyone please help me with correct names. The Caryophyllaceae pics have Arenaria cretica in their file name but that's just a wild guess. It is also very common in the alpine zone of Mt. Helmos and has a fantastic brown (late summer?) autumn/ winter colour, but I think it's green during its growing season.

[Katherine J]

It really looks for all the world like a Delosperma (of all things...)

I also think it is a Delosperma. Why did you exclude that solution Jan?

[Hans J]

Excuse me -but the home of Delosperma is Southern Africa 

[Katherine J]

 
Thank you for the information, Hans!

[Carlo]

...and yet I grow Delosperma HERE....

You really didn't give too much information in the beginning. Photographed without flowers at 1500m near a mountain. In a garden? In the wild? In a spot where it's unlikely that a garden was ever present?

We're playing a guessing game and everything should be fair game...

[Kees Jan]

Kathrin,

I excluded Delosperma because this genus doesn't grow wild in Europe. I can see why some people think this plant looks a bit succulent, but having seen it in the wild I don't think it's a succulent plant, to me it looked a bit like a very small Armeria juniperifolia, but that is not native in Greece either. The leaves are much smaller than the leaves in any Delosperma that I know, but one of the pics is a close-up so that might give the wrong impression.

Carlo,

As stated in my initial message Mount Killini is a mountain in the Northern Peloponnesos (Peloponnesos is in southern Greece). The plants are all photographed in the wild on Mount Killini, there is certainly no chance that they excaped from a garden, this is a rather wild and isolated mountain.

Gerd,

I don't think it's Saponaria. The leaves are certainly much smaller than Saponaria pumilio for instance. A flower or fruit in any of these plants would make it easier, wouldn't it. Perhaps I should go back in summer  ?


On mystery seems to be solved since the wonderful Crataegus seems to be Crataegus pycnoloba, which only grows wild on Killini and a few other mountains in the Peloponnesos . See http://www.botanic-garden.ku.dk/kic/Christensen-filer/Page899.htm

Anyway, I finally managed to find a picture of a flowering mystery plant, also photographed on Mount Killini, possibly Viola chelmaea??