Summer flowers in the Zillertal alps

[Peter Maguire]

11. Swallowtail butterfly - a slightly tatty specimen, but there wern't many around that landed obligingly for photography.
12. Stilluptal - one of the smaller valleys, accesible by private minibus, but it didn't go very high, we gave this valley a miss this time.
13. Campanula barbata - detail
14. Scabiosa lucida - difficult to photgraph well, it looks good in a large group. This was taken as we began our descent through alpine heathland then meadow.

[Peter Maguire]

16. Campanula cochlearifolia
17. Campanula cochlearifolia - detail
18. Lathyrus pratensis
19. ? Gentianella germamica

All these taken in alpine heathland just below 2000m on the Penkenjoch.

[Peter Maguire]

20. Silene vulgaris - I find this is common all over the alps at this time of year.
21. Ranunculus aconitifolium - surprisingly unimpressive, this was poking out from under a duckboard in a boggy area of the meadow.
22. Geranium sylvaticum - there was a very large colony in the meadows at about 1900m.
23. The meadow area, stunning views again.

[Peter Maguire]

24. Dactylorhiza majalis - I was suprised to still see orchids at this time of the year. They were present throughout a boggy area and the adjacent coniferous woodland. We saw a better colony later in the week.
25. Finally down in the valley, a reminder of autumn. Ribes alpinum berries - nearly ripe too.

That's all of this group. I have further photos if people are not yet sated with Austrian alpine flowers, but  am away for a few days down south visiting friends and relatives. Will post some more after next week. I'm currently getting 'significant looks' because I should be packing.

Peter.

[hadacekf]

Peter,
The unknown yellow-white plant is Hieracium intybaceum
and the next pictures show Phyteuma scheuchzeri.

[Peter Maguire]

Franz,

Many thanks for the identifications, I would never have worked those out for myself! Sorry not to have replied earlier, but I have been away visiting friends and getting seriously behind in my bulb repotting; Ian Y would be disappointed with me.

Anyway, here are some further pictures from the Zillertal area, this time from the main side valley, the Zillergrund. This can be done by bus, a journey which terminates on top of a dam at 1850m, the lake being called the Speicher Zillergrundl (would a literal translation of this be 'Zillergrund storage'?). As with most of thse trips, there is a restaurant at the bus terminus, so the walk began with a leisurely coffee.

1. The first view is of the dam, I know it's an artificial structure, but I never fail to be impressed by the construction involved. The figure conveniently placed for scale is Mrs M.
2. Behind the restaurant, which is itself built into the cliff above the dam and accessed by a walkway bolted to the rockface are some plants which I am quite sure did not arrive by themselves; firstly Sempervivum arachnoideum. A very floriferous specimen which looked better than most of the willd ones I saw which were generally confined to the tops of large boulders.
3. Leontopodium alpinum; I could hardly go to Austria and fail to see Edelweiss!
4. The first 800m of the walk along the lake is through a tunnel, something of an experience on mountain walking for me but refreshingly cool, especially on the return journey. THe 'ghostly' figures are due to the long exposure time.

[Peter Maguire]

5. The view up the lake to the upper reaches of the valley. The whole walk is fairly level, and although 1850m is not high for July, there was a good range of flowers to be seen. Further up the valley is an alpine hut, and as climbing is thirsty work they had......
6. a beer delivery! The truck completely filled the track and grounded on the stream crossings. I know it was a hot day, but those climbers must have been desperate for a beer.
7. Just by this cascade was an overhang with many saxifrages growing underneth it is the plentiful water supply. I'm mindful of my earlier saxifarage mis-identifiaction, but I think that this is possibly Saxifraga stellaris.
8. There was a colony of Saxifraga azoides, with one orange flowered plant.
9. Overview of the colony - the orange plant stood out a mile!

[Peter Maguire]

10. A solitary specimen of Gentiana purpurea tucked under a bush.
11. I don't know what this plant was; the flowers were quite attractive in detail, but it was quite a coarse leaved plant with relatively small flowers in proportion. Perhaps it would suit a woodland garden.
12. Dactylorhiza majalis was fairly common here, in damp area alongside the path (there was a lot of run-off from the slopes above). This was the best specimen I found.
13. Looking back to the dam gives some impression of the habitat - open woodland, with occasional cliffs.
14. One of the pleasant aspects of a July visit is the number of butterflies around. This one is, I think, the misnamed (in English) Scarce Copper, Heodes virgaureae. I did wonder whether to post the butterflies under 'wildlife' but felt that if I left them here it would give a better flavour of the area.
15. Arctostaphylus uva-ursi in fruit. Already a sign of the approaching autumn.

[Peter Maguire]

16. Two guesses on the identification here. The Geranium is G. pratense I believe, and the butterfly is probably Eumedonia eumedon, which has the english name of Geranium Argus!
17. Returning back along the track, we passed the overhang with the saxifrages again. If I'm correct and this is Saxifraga adscendens, then there were three species in this small area.
18. Another butterfly, Mesoacidalia aglaja, the Dark-green Fritillary.
19. Having returend to the dam and caught the bus to the restaurant in the valley bottom for a leisurely lunch (we take our adventurous walking seriously in the Maguire household), we continued along the valley floor at about 1200m. Even here one could find Sempervivum archoideum, and other alipnes in flower this late in the season. The meadows were full of Silene vulgaris again.

[Peter Maguire]

20. I was pleasantly surprised to find a patch of violets still in flower also - Viola tricolor?
21. Meadow plants at this point in the season seem to consist largely of composites, this one I've confidently identified as Centaurea sp.!
22. And finally for this walk a specimen of Campanula patula. One problem with photographing plants in the depths of the valley in late afternoon is the low light levels which make it difficult to get a good depth of focus. It was at least shaded from wind, which makes this species difficult to photograph, and as I found that I was lying on an anthill to take the photograph, then I felt I should share the experience...

I have another batch of photos which come from a trip up onto the Hintertux glacier ski area, and will try to post these over the next day or so.

Peter

[Lesley Cox]

These are super Peter, many thanks for posting them all. I just love that orange butterfly and the chequered one, but I love her name even more!

[ichristie]

Hi Peter, super pictures. dare I suggest that the male as usual is perhaps the best, cheers Ian the Christie kind.

[Brian Ellis]

Hello Peter, Thanks for a really interesting thread with some great photos.  I enjoy Kit Grey-Wilson's lectures tremendously for their mix of flora, fauna, people and views and you have got the mix just right too. 

[Paddy Tobin]

Great, great show, Peter. Really enjoyed the photographs.

Paddy

[Peter Maguire]

Thanks to everyone for their kind words. I have one final instalment of this epic to finish, but as I see that Ian M is just recently beginning to post his photos from early July, then I don't feel too bad about the delay.

The final flower trip of the holiday was to the Hintertux glacier which lies at the head of the longest of the side valleys from Mayrhofen (we're getting very closr to the Italian border here folks). The attraction of this area is that the summer lift system goes to higher altitude than elsewhere in the area, and there is the possiblilty of a differnt range of plants still being in flower. The summer pass to the area takes you to the top of the first lift, Sommerbergalm at 1990m. where you can then purchase a ticket to go higher, in two stages to the frontier ridge (and summer skiing area) at 3270m. On the day we were there, the clouds were on the tops and beginning to descend, so we just took the first lift to 2600m, marked Tuxer-Ferner-Haus on the maps. This was probably a wise choice as skiers were already coming down on the lifts by lunchtime and I could not be sure that there were any uncovered rocks higher up.

Ascending the first lift revealed some quite good stands of Rhododendron ferrugineum in flower at about 1850m, possibly becasue the slope is north facing.

1. Shows the first stop on the cable cars. There is a very large cafe here which does reasonable food. The next cable car station is at the top of the rounded grey-green area about 1/3 of the way in from the left of the picture in front of a snow field. I couldn't say exactly where the cable car station on this ridge is, as the clouds began to close in after this picture was taken.
2. Before proceeding up higher, in the local area were the usual masses of Campanula rotundifolia and this fine plant. I keep wanting to call it Gypsophila repens, but we certainly weren't on limestone, so any suggestions would be appreciated.
3. Arriving at 2600m one is confronted with this mess. Yes it's a glacial moraine and could be expected to look a little untidy in the summer, but there is extensive mechanical earth moving going on, presumably to enhance the skiing experience. However if you can find undisturbed moriane, even in this area, there was a lot to be seen. From the cable car on the way up, there were extensive patches of Cirsium spinosissimum, but it doesn't photograph well from 50 feet up. Also on the moraine just bwelow the cable car station were extensive patches of something yellow... More on this later.
4. Faith was restored by looking down at my feet. A large outcrop of rock had this fine patch of Leucnthemopsis alpina growing in it.
5. To return to the glacier for a moment, I wondered whether this was a consequence of global warming; there were extensive areas of the glacier covered with white tarpaulins, we're talking of areas of at least 500m by 500m here. Was this to slow the rate of glacial retreat?