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Project Noah Nature School
Leontopodium alpinum
The hard to access pretty edelweiss, symbol of alpine plants, was spotted here at the bottom of the North face of the Matterhorn, Switzerland (2nd shot). Each bloom consists of five to six small flower heads which are surrounded by woolly bracts in star formation. Blooms between July and September.
Rocky limestone soils at 2000–2900 m altitude.
The common name comes from German edel, which means "noble", and weiss, meaning "white". This plant is protected in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Sheep grazing is detrimental to its growth as these animals will pull the plant's roots out.
Spotted on Jul 9, 2011
Submitted on Jul 11, 2011
10 Comments
Thanks Daniele. That's a start, although I think that the Noah approach could be a bit more intuitive than only applying the zoom out to critically endangered spp. There's also the issue that detailed notes can also give directions. I'm comforted to know that you'll be keeping an eye on things.
I might have a few pics from near Chartreuse but I think most are on an old computer. Would love to be back there sometime soon. Got some Sierra Nevada sightings but that's just out of range.
Hi Craig, thanks for your feedback. You make a very good point, a critical issue with Noah as it is open to the public and ideally the founders want data to feed into research as well. At this stage this is the way Noah deals with endangered species submissions (from the FAQ): "At this time, if we find out that a submitted spotting is of a critically endangered species in the wild, we will zoom out the map and drop the location pin at a higher and more general level". I'll keep an eye on this mission for poaching-sensitive plants. If you have any other suggestions we'd like to hear about them. Hope to see you bringing spottings back from the Alps!
Hey Daniele. This is a nice Mission that you've started but I'm not sure about the request for specific information regarding location of some of these plants. If it's necessary for research purposes, I don't think it should be publicly visible. Some of this flora is still poached and that kind of information can be rather sensitive.
Arlanda! You wrote your comment just as I was replying to Lars! See my comment above. It's not that hard if you know where to look. You have to hike above 2000m, find ungrazed rocky limestone soils, and look carefully ;-)
You need to know where they are Lars :-) You must find the right type of soil and make sure there are no sheep around. I've got a couple of spots where I still see them every year. There were only two others with this one... The funny thing is that they can easily be cultivated! But finding the wild ones is special.
nice flower!
Is it really so difficult to find?
congratulations for finding one - they've been rare ever since, but these days it must be nearly impossible to spot one, isn't it?
Thanks LauraMaria and Emma! Even though they can be cultivated it's always special to find a wild one...
Thanks for sharing!
What a great shot, Daniele! I love the scenery in the second photo :) This flower always makes me think of the Sound of Music haha!