Wildflowers in the Montagne Noir - Part 1

This was a wildflower outing organised by Birding Languedoc last week, one that we had done before in May 2021. We started the day above the village of Siran in the Minervois. Due to firebreaks keeping the vegetation down it has allowed the wildflowers room to flourish without competition from the nearby trees and shrubs. This is garrigue habitat, where most plants grow low to the ground in rocky free draining soil, where they cope with hot dry summers due to small tough leaves, and/or summer hibernation.

There were only seven of us on the trip: Philippa who leads the BL trips and Gill who was our plant expert for the day. Also present were a couple of guys I know who are pretty knowledgeable about plants/birds/insects, so it made for an easier day with most plants fairly readily identified.

Whilst we had some great views over the plain to the Corbieres and distant Pyrenees, it was a very windy day so we were blasted by the cold wind until we could get to some more sheltered spots!

Being here a month earlier than the last time allowed us some fabulous displays of Asphodels (I don't know species name, possibly Asphodelus cerasiferus?. Edit: Though I see from my photos that some of them are Branched Asphodels (A. ramosus)).

My favourite garrigue plant is Cistus, particularly this Grey-leaved Cistus (Cistus albidus) with its lovely crinkly pink flowers. Also in this image is Thyme (Thymus vulgaris) which was everywhere, and Curry Plant. I hadn't realised that Curry Plant can be either Helichrysum italicum or H. stoechas. I thought they were one and the same plant! I can't tell which exact species were the ones we saw, that's impossible!

One of the stars of the day were these Pyrenean Fritillaries (Fritillaria pyrenaica).

Clockwise from top left: Rush-leaved Narcissus (Narcissus assoanus), Common Storksbill (Erodium ciconium), Perennial Lettuce (Latuca perennis) and White Rock-rose (Helianthemum apenninum).

A giant Puffball fungus well past its best.

Young shoots and flower buds of Kermes Oak (Quercus coccifera), the low growing oak found on garrigue habitat.

Thyme

We saw quite a lot of these Green-winged Orchids (Anacamptis morio) which were growing out in the open (photo on left), but only very few Provencal Orchids (Orchis provincialis) in more sheltered spots.

More Asphodels and Grey-leaved Cistus.

Our hardy wildflower loving group. 😀

We had our picnic in a sheltered spot nearby which was the only place where I saw butterflies, although one of our group spotted a few brave flutters hugging the ground during the day.

The afternoon's finds will be in part 2.