Kubed

Kubed is a village in the Primorska region in Slovenia. Above the village there is a natural rock wall. On top of the wall is an old fortified church called Sveti Florijan (Holy Florijan). There are a lot of houseleeks on the wall. However, I believe that these are an old introduction of cultivated plants and not a natural locality because:

- they grow on only part of the wall and not more to the right, where the wall looks equally suitable

- they grow in very large clusters, unlike the native Sempervivum which typically grow in very small clusters of only a few plants

- they grow associated with very large clumps of irises, which also give a "cultivated" appearance

- a few semps are very pale coloured, as a cultivar and unlike wild plants

Beautiful photos! Have you done some climbing?

Fortunately there is no real need to climb here: from underneath you can have a good view at a few meters distance.

I was actually on the way back from the hill Kuk, which is part of the Kraški Rob system. I was hoping to be able to photograph native houseleeks on Kuk, but didn't see any. I have seen only a small part of Kuk, so it's inconclusive again. I have difficulties finding the "many localities" which are supposed to be at Kraški Rob, for instance I searched quite a lot around Črni kal -also unsuccessfull.

I passed Kubed yesterday. I expected to see flowering irisses, but was somewhat disapointed. Not only was the majority past flowering, the few last flowers that were open were clearly Iris barbata, so garden irisses. A minority of plants has longer flower stalks and is not yet flowering: I think that these are the endemic Iris pallida: one typical flower was already open and confirmed this. Below the wall, in a village garden, was a flowering clump of Iris pallida. This all confirms what I already suspected: the fantastic wall vegetation under the church is not natural, but in stead a planted "garden" on a natural rock wall.

The semps are green, without the greyish look which native semps from Primorska often have. They have relatively pointed leaves with reddish brown tips. In fact, I have the impression that most, perhaps even all, are just one clone. There is variation, of course, but not more than I would expect because of growing circumstances. They make really long stolons, at least up to 15 cm and sometimes more. My impression is that this is rare in the local native semps and it is another indication that these plants might come from "who knows where" ...  

Neverteless: it is a really nice "garden"!

p.s. Iris pallida is in this case the same as Iris illyrica or Iris pallida ssp. illyrica. I mean the locally native and very beautifull Iris.

I have revisited the site yesterday: none of the Irisses is native: on the wall are all I. barbata/germanica, which are past flowering. Besides the wall are many clumps of "modern garden hybrids". The "pallida-like" plant in the village is also a modern garden hybrid (I saw real pallida some days ago for easier comparison).