What a perfect present….an evening with Anders Often, one of Norway’s leading botanists and a lovely person too! Thank you Randy Gunnar Lange and Ingunn Bohmann. I’d never met him before, but had emailed with him about old relic locations of Hablitzia some years back.
We walked from Eikeløkka through an amazing varied landscape, in places extremely poor with twisted pine trees and ground covering spruce, in others rich where marine sediments had been deposited, to the highest point on Kirkøy, Hvaler (Botneveten) at just over 70m from where there were amazing views showing a forest covered island and with spectacular panoramic views towards the Koster Islands (where I’ve been a couple of times: http://www.edimentals.com/blog/?p=4225), Strømstad, Svinesund and Torbjørnskjær (where we had a buoy measuring marine environmental parameters in the 90s!)
Anders showing us a pincushion moss (blåmose)
Pincushion moss (blåmose)
Spruce trees had a very special form in places hugging the ground under a pine tree!
The pine trees seemed to be growing on almost nothing and were much older than one would think…
Anders counting annual rings on one small tree…it was around 20 years old!
Anders called these special pines “knausfuru” and told us they could be very old
One of 3 information boards on the top
A tumulus (gravrøys) from the iron or bronse age on top (they were placed with a good view during that period)
View towards Svinesund bridge (the boundary with Sweden)
Another ground hugging spruce under a pine
Anders told us here of the difference between the native and cultivated forms of spruce. The latter more often have several tops and irregular growth…this one had probably been damaged as a small tree…and a kink in the trunk can also be seen high up on the right
This was a hybrid oak
One branch of this rose was sprouting from the warnth of the rock
Cirsium palustre
What made this perfectly round hole in the ground?
We didn’t see any, but woodlark (trelerke) breed here!
One small patch of ostrich fern
Anders explained that this was an old beach, where waves crashed at one time
Documentation of yet another amazing day during last week’s Perennialen III in Hardanger!! Pictures taken on a fantastic 6-7 hour round trip from Eirik Lillebøe Wiken and Hege Iren Aasdal Wiken’s house to their shieling (støl or seter in Norwegian). We took our time botanising on the way up, passing through different types of forest on the way up, from alder (or), ash (ask), planted spruce (gran), lime (lind), elm (alm), hazel (hassel), aspen (osp) and birch (bjørk) at the highest levels. Lower down, old apple trees witnessed that these steep slopes had at one time been worked for fruit production, no easy matter….
Eirik and Hege are planning to rejuvenate and replant some of this area and have planted a multispecies forest garden above and below the house, probably one of the most dramatic forest gardens in the world (more later).
A picture of Alvastien Telste taken last year showing the house at the bottom centre and the walk to the ridge at the top and beyond!
Starting our walk up the mountain, I took this picture of a farm on the other side of the fjord and, next picture, a shieling (seter / støl) is visible on the ridge at the top!
Shieling (seter / støl)
The house at Alvastien Telste
Ostrich fern (strutseving)
Eirik and Hege’s tree house (I stayed there on my first visit – Perennialen I)
Under the spruce, a ground cover of young ash seedlings…the future of which is uncertain as Ash dieback has arrived here…
Impaties noli-tangere (Touch me not balsam / springfrø) was common on damper soils
Ostrich fern (strutseving) with enchanters nightshade (trollurt)
Cirsium arvense on a small open field halfway up the hill
Campanula
Late flowering Silene dioica (red campion /rød jonsokblom)
Ostrich fern (strutseving)
Alder tongue gall (Taphrina alni)
Mycelis muralis
Galium odoratum (woodruff / myske)
Rock to which an old cable lift was attached
Fox dung with beetle cases?
Old apple tree half way up
We saw one small population of hedge garlic (løkurt)
Wood vetch (skogsvikke)
Clambering wood vetch (skogsvikke)
Hazel (hassel)
More ostrich fern (strutseving)
There were many amazing trees, many of which were pollarded (for animal feed in the past)
Old barn
Pyrola spp.
Woodruff (myske)
The Troll Elm!
Eirik showed us an old cross on the rock marking the edge of his property
This ostrich fern had over 30 fertile fronds in the centre!!
I was surpised to find an area of Geranium lucidum
Woodruff (myske)
Steep slopes
Galium spp.
…the rain came down near the top
Fantastic views of the fjord on the way up!
Frosted bracken?
Rut pool used by red deer stags!
There weren’t many edible fungi apart from one good patch of chantarelles in the birch zone
Picking chantarelles
…and, finally, after 4 hours we reached the hut!
Foxglove (revebjelle) within the protection of this old wall
