Plants of the Mediterranean Gallery

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26. In the same park in Izmir grew (and still grows, I hope) this handsome grove of California fan palms -- Washingtonia filifera. This species is native to a few canyons and desert streambanks in the American Southwest, but it is widely used horticulturally in the warmer parts of the world. Note the old inflorescences (flowering and fruiting structures) hanging down from the trees' crowns, as well as the "petticoats" of dead leaves that droop to cover the upper portion of the trunk. Compare with the plant of the same species shown in my Plants of the Southwestern U. S. Gallery.

25. A stately specimen of Cedrus atlantica, the Atlas cedar, growing in a city park in Izmir (Smyrna), Turkey, in 1976. This species, native of the Atlas Mountains of North Africa, is widely planted as an ornamental elsewhere. In all likelihood, this is a cultivar (cultivated variety) selected for its glaucous or pale blue foliage. It may even be C. a. 'Glauca'.

1. The remarkably harsh environment of the southern Sinai Peninsula, fronting the Red Sea. This acacia tree (probably the umbrella acacia, Acacia tortilis subsp. raddiana) looks dead, but it actually bears tiny compound leaves on its long-spined branches. Its main environmental challenge -- besides the thrumming heat and severe scarcity of fresh water -- is the browsing animals of the bedouins. I saw a camel come up to one formidably beweaponed tree and nibble off several of its stems without the slightest concern for its spines.

3. In the Byzantine ghost town of Mistra, not far from Sparta, in the Peloponnesus. The severely fastigiate (columnar) trees at right are good examples of one of the great botanical landmarks of the Mediterranean Basin -- the Italian cypress (Cupressus sempervirens).

2. A botanical Where's Waldo. Can you spot this scene's tree community? This is the same area of the southeastern Sinai Peninsula shown in No. 1. In this brutal habitat, vegetation is very sparse, with just a few well-spaced umbrella acacias and shrubs dotting the stony granite terrain. In comparison, the Sonoran Desert of southern Arizona looks like a well-stocked garden center during the spring rush.

4. A December day in Verona. This is the impresive cedar of Lebanon (Cedrus libani) that stands next to the city's famous Roman amphitheater. The mopheaded conifer in the right background is apparently an Atlas cedar (Cedrus atlantica -- also see the Turkey section, below).

5. Ecco il faggio. This is good Harold in Italy country: the Abruzzi Mountains at Roccaraso. The tree in the foreground is the august European beech (Fagus sylvatica). Beech woodlands, such as the one in the background, are one of the dominant plant communities of Italy's mountainous spine.

6. In lower hills, closer to the sea, the Mediterranean biome (a large-scale, climate-controlled plant community) is evident. Originally, much of the Mediteranean area was oak- and pine-dominated evergreen forest, but after many centuries of intensive human use, other more degraded plant regimes predominate. In this locale, between Sperlonga and Itri, one see examples of these regimes. On the rocky, open slope above the road is garrigue; below it, especially near the house at lower right, is a fair approxi-mation of maquis. The latter has a preponderance of high shrubs, little visible bedrock, and more surviving soil. Human-inflicted damage has taken many forms, from fires set by farmers and shepherds to intense logging (much of it for firewood and shipbuilding) and the grazing of those supreme environmental terrorists, domesticated goats and sheep.

8. A much different Mediterranean legume, at Terracina's Temple of Jupiter site on the Tyrrhenian coast. This tree, shimmering in the full Mediterranean sunlight, is a carob (Ceratonia siliqua). The species bears seed pods that have been used to produce a widely marketed chocolate substitute. It's a handsome and drought-tolerant tree, but its male flowers generate a powerful odor that is hell's own version of a sweaty locker room.

7. In the Auruncian Mountains near Spigno Saturnia. One of the characteristic garrigue plants is Spanish broom, Spartium junceum. This leguminous shrub sheds its leaves during the hot, dry summer months, but its persistent green stems are photosynthetic, too.

9. The site of the prestigious Wiggers Institute for Advanced Mediterranean Biome and Auruncian Mountain Research (W.I.A.M.B.A.M.R.), located in Spigno Saturnia Vecchio. From 1976-78 this state-of-the-art facility was the headquarters for several poorly funded expeditions, and as such was specially equipped with a fully functional front door, Franklin stove, occasional electricity and running water, and small black scorpions that liked to hide in my shoes. It also had the strategic advantage of being situated over a limestone cavern complex, into which it could have subsided at any moment. Note Mobile Research Unit 1, a high-performance Opel Kadett, parked under the Vitis vinifera vines. This and the surrounding vinyards produced a vino rosso which, when aged about half an hour and served in galvanized buckets, produced, even in small doses, the worst hangover humankind has ever known.

10. A brisk hike up the hill from the prestigious Wiggers Institute brought me to the Auruncian Mountains upland: shepherd's meadows, Spanish-chestnut groves, and a di-verse community of Mediterranean wildflowers. This top-of-the-line plant-kingdom representative is Orchis italica, one of the native orchids that is a calciphile -- it loves the alkaline substrate derived from the limestone bedrock.

11. Another Auruncian native, the late spider orchid (Ophrys fuciflora). Its small flowers may seem no match for those of large, cultivated orchids, but careful scrutiny under a hand lens reveals a remarkably intricate pattern of colors used to attract insect pollinators.

14. In Campagna, near Nola, in the shadow of Vesuvius. If the straight-as-a-ramrod Italian cypress is one classic Med-iterrranean tree, so is its opposite in form -- the umbrella or stone pine (Pinus pinea).

15. Another grove of umbrella pines, on Isola di Caprera, in the La Maddalena archipelago of Sardinia. This species, genetically programmed to form broad, flat crowns, provides welcome shade from the bright Mediteranean sun.

17. North American naturalists are well aware that various European plants have become troublesome weeds in the New World. However, this process works both ways. This Indian-fig prickly pear (Opuntia ficus-indica), growing in La Maddalena, Sardinia, belongs to a species that was introduced to the Mediterranean region from Mexico. In the Old World it has become an all-too adaptable pest, even if it is used horticulturally as well.

16. Also on the Isola di Caprera, at the gravesite and last home of Giuseppe Garibaldi. This stunning succulent plant is candelabra aloe (Aloe arborescens). While it obviously thrives in this locale, it is actually a native of South Africa.

18. Century plants (Agave americana) at Siracusa, Sicily. As its specific epithet suggests, this succulent is a New World native, too. Century plants are now found practically everywhere in the Mediterranean Basin.

20. The view from La Giralda, the famous belltower of the Seville cathedral. You're looking at the Patio de los Naranjos -- a courtyard of orange trees in a city that gave its name to one particular citrus species (Citrus aurantium, the Seville or sour orange). Ironically, the Seville orange isn't native to Spain; it was introduced from its home area of southeast Asia in late Medieval times.

21. This scene, the very essence of rugged Mediterranean limestone terrain, shows Cape Formentor, on the northern tip of the largest of the Balearic Islands, Mallorca. In the foreground stand Aleppo pines (Pinus halepensis), one of the toughest of a tough breed. This species grows happily in poor or almost no soil, in very stressful settings -- such as this rocky, windy promentory.

25. Along the road northwest of Port Mahon, on the less tourist-trammeled Balearic island of Menorca. This, to me, is our planet's best attempt at a storybook landscape. The red-flowered herbaceous plant in the foreground is sulla (Hedysarum coronarium), also known rather misleadingly as French honeysuckle. It's a striking legume that is often grown as a forage or hay crop.

13. The ferns living in the twilit gloom of the bottom of a Spigno Saturnia Vecchio sinkhole are great calciphiles, too. The strap-leaved plant with entire leaves on the far right edge of the photo is Hart's-tongue fern (Asplenium scolopendrium). This remarkable and horticulturally prized species is native to Europe, Asia, and North America.

23. The Sierra de Tramuntana is also an excellent region to see and study the Mediterranean evergreen-forest habitat. Here, pines and drought-resistant oaks colonize the steep mountainsides.

22. In many spots, Mallorca is much too commercialized for the naturalist's soul to tolerate, but the Sierra de Tamuntana on the big island's western coast still has its magnificent wild places. Here, along a lonely roadside, blooms a classic calciphilic Mediterranean shrub -- rock rose (Cistus albidus). Its grayish, hairy leaves help the plant retain precious moisture during the hot, dry summer months.