Pulsatilla/Pasque Flower - Easter flower

Pulsatilla - Pasque Flower (Easter Flower) - Kobjælde

Pulsatilla pratensis, Pasque flower, Nikkende kobjælde: The 6 purple flower heads are silky haired and longer than the many yellow stamens. The fruit stand is easy to recognize. It looks like a powder puff, the seeds are hairy and has a 5-6 cm long griffel. The fruit stand is not nodding like the flower is, but upright. The flower is rarely yellow-green or white. It can make hybrids with Pulsatilla vulgaris, but this is very rare.

The pratensis can be mistaken for the vulgaris, but the vulgaris is upright while flowering, and it is more bluish purple than the pratensis. The pratensis has a massive stem, filled with marrow, while the vulgaris has a hollow stem.It flowers in April-May (in DK) here and there on sunny hills, especially in North Jutland and upon the Isles. It grows in open calcium-rich sand- or gravel soil and is especially known from pastures, hills and banks.

Pulsatilla pratensis is relatively rare in Denmark.

The Pulsatilla pratensis is vaguely poisonous and with a sharp taste of the substance anemonol - and it is avoided by grazing animals. The Danish name Nikkende Kobjælde means nodding cowbell, and the nodding flowers look like the bells around the cow's neck in Norway and the Alps - but the name might also have a relation to its habitat and to the flowering, which is when the cows come out on grass in spring. Like many other flowers it had many nicknames in the old days: fluffy boys, cowbell, ox-ear, king's bell , boy's shaving brush. People appreciated it because it was one of the finest spring flowers and the very first which like a little bell was being moved here and there by the wind, like it was ringing people and cattle to dinner. It was swept in the finest fur and the fluffy flowerbuds looked like little feathered baby birds in a nest. "It appears like a small fluffy troll in his tight white fur". "It looks like a little harefoot springing up from the sand".
There were many sayings about this little Easter flower.

Pulsatilla vulgaris/ Common Pasque flower/Opret Kobjælde

Pulsatilla vulgaris, Common Pasque Flower, Dane's blood /Opret Kobjælde appears with the bell-shaped flower in early spring. It grows here and there in Jutland. It has purple flowers, but there are white and light red sorts. Its habitat is pastures or banks with a calcium-rich gravel soil. It is dependent on that grass and other aggresive herbaceous plants are being grazed or cut. Upon the grazed areas the plant is favored by that the cattle avoid it because of its toxicity. In Cotswold in England is a large colony of Pulsatilla vulgaris.


The Pulsatilla vulgaris is the most important ingredience in the French tonic hépatotum, taken for the liver (Crise de foie) and for the production of gall.  It has some old nicknames too, like blue weather herb and cow ball.

Pulsatilla vulgaris is rare in Denmark and should not be plucked in nature.


The Pulsatilla vernalis , Spring Pasque Flower/ Vår-Kobjælde), is a very low plant, with redbrown or purple, silky haired flower head. It grows in a few places in Jutland. Large bell-shaped, first nodding, then upright flowers - and the vernalis cannot be mistaken for any other flower plant in Denmark. After flowering a large tuft of light seed-wool is formed. The vernalis flowers in April-May-June on dry, poor soil in heaths in Jutland. The fresh plant is poisonous. It was used as a medical herb in various diseases. It was latest seen in Denmark 10 april 2009 in Ulfborg statssskovdistrikt. The Pulsatilla vernalis is the county flower of Oppland, Norway and is depicted in the county coat of arms.

Pulsatilla vernalis is very rare in Denmark , and it is totally listed. 

Pulsatilla in general:
Folk Medicine:
1546: a wine decoct from root or seeds to drink in order to drive out bladder stones and menses; the herb or destilled water from the herb to cleanse bad wounds, remove dead meat.

1648: the crushed plant placed as a compress upon the wrist against coldfever (malaria); the juice rubbed upon warts; the dried and pulverized root provokes sneeze like snuff.

1688: the flower used as a compress on a fever pulse; a tea from the plant was drunk against gouts. The herb was sold in pharmacies.
 
Other Use:

copy from Inks and pens.

Children made the fruitstand wet and combed back "the hair" and braided blades of grass into it;  they tickle each other with this "hairy brush" under the nose and said: " Do you wish to smell this hairy boy?" The stiff stalk with the fruit stand is called the boys' shaving brush.

1761: From the flower juice was produced green ink. Easter eggs were coloured green with the flowers in the boiling water.

In WWII  it was recommended to use the roots, which contains saponin as a surrogate for soap bark for  delicate wash.

Source: V. J Brøndegaard, folk og flora, bd. 2 Dansk Etnobotanik,  Rosenkilde og Bagger; Danmarks fugle og Natur, Felthåndbogen, april 2012. 

Photo, Bjerre, Thy: stig bachmann nielsen, Naturplan.dk 

Ice on the Water - Snow in the Sky.

A Taste of Denmark

Winter

Once again a visit to the small island Alrø in Horsens fjord, the latest couple of visits for the same reason, to see the white tailed eagle, who's always in another place anyway, when we're there - probably sitting on the island of Vorsø, which has got public access for birds only. But it's good to be out in the countryside to get some fresh air instead of the black city air, and the narrow country roads are not very traffic. Although it's a part of our neighbourhood close to Århus then there are still places, we haven't seen yet. In the winter season we take relative short trips. As you can see the day is dark, and the day is short too . The light is quickly disappearing in the afternoon, and it is cold to be out for long.

Two horses in a field often walk together. I think they like company. I feel pity with a horse who's quite alone. Maybe I'm wrong?  Well, two friends, those two horses. The landscape shows that the snow is still here. We've got rid of it in town, this happens quickly, already while it is snowing - and often in the middle of the night.  I can hear the snowmen driving through the streets and in front of our building to remove the snow. They really have to get up early. In the country the snow stays put except on the traffic roads. I wouldn't be able to live in a house in the country. Furthermore there are no shops.

But in this district there is one little village after another, and I took some photos along the way of farms and houses - it was funny, because there were so many halftimbered houses in black and white. Maybe they copy each other. The big halftimbered black and white house is a vicarage. Many priests live in a pretty vicarage, but it's not sunny days always to be a priest. They've got many obligations. A priest is dependent on the parish council and what they decide. If the council don't like their new vicar they can make life difficult for him. I can imagine it's not an easy job to be a priest, and his wife has to be an outgoing and social person. No, the pretty vicarage might be dearly bought!








































                                                                                

what about some weight-control?

There were two fields next to each other, one with a lonely pony with a heavy forelock covering one eye and one with the nice friendly cattle with belts - the belted Galloway. They origin from Scotland, they are hornless and  the earliest British cattle, and the opinion is that they came from the hornless cattle of the Scythians from year 485-425 B.C. The fur is traditionally black-brown. The Galloway cattle has outer and inner fur with long cover-hair and a curly woolen under-fur, which isolates against both cold and heat. The cover-hair is water-repellent. The original Scottish Galloway is lesser than the Amercian. The Scottish bull weighs about 700-800 kilos. The Galloways are peaceful and easy to deal with, but if the flock is threatened,  they stick together and form a united front against the enemy.

listening with one ear...

Then we were passing a couple of white washed churches by the road, and opposite a church was a little village house with an outhouse with the same simple decoration of small red bricks. Three ponies stood in a thick layer of hay. It's important to have warm feet. Everyone knows that!  And not far from each other two buzzards in top of a tree. One was very "light-headed". They were waiting for a traffic victim! Well, yes they actually often are in the winter season. If an animal is run over by a car, it won't last long before it has disappeared, if there's a  predator in the neighbourhood. The birds of prey are among  Nature's garbage men. 

the black stripe is birds

looking for birds on the ice.

the first sight of the frozen sea ...

And now we came to the island Alrø which I have shown you a couple of times. I could see from the first sight when we reached the dam that the water in Horsens fjord was completely frozen. Everything was white, land joined water. I was a little surprised about the difference between this sea and the sea at Århus, where we came from. The sea at Århus was blue and shining like a mirror this morning. Some of the ice on the fjord had been pushed into frozen waves and looked like whipped cream. There was not a bird to see anywhere, not even geese and swans on the fields. There was nothing to eat. The grass was frozen too. Only one car when we came out to the only parking place in the southern end of the island. A young couple tried to take a little walk.  The wind made it colder and they gave up after five minutes. I gave up after almost the same and sat in the car drinking thermo-coffee and eating the traditional Wiener-Pecan-cake. Many birds gathered along an opening in the ice far out. The white-tailed eagle was probably on the next island,  also too far away.

two men with telescope

then outermost farm

the village street

Two men were walking along the coast with a telescope, when we drove back to the main land. They were probably on their way to a place, from which they can watch across and over to some small islands, called the Alrø Poller. The island Alrø is an eldorado for birds of all kinds. The low water and the protected area give optimal conditions for the bird life. Alrø is EF-habitat area, EF-bird protection area and Ramsar area. This means that plants, animals and nature types are largely protected. Hunting is forbidden in a section of the sea, and walking about on the small islands Alrø Poller is forbidden most of the year.
























As you can see from today's photos the day was dark and with snow in the sky. The colours had a dark blue, which grew darker and darker with the vanishing light, the darkest of ultramarine.

No matter if it was cold and I was freezing my feet, I enjoyed being out to see how nature was now on this day in February. But I'm looking forward anyway to some sunny day in March and April, where the first signs of spring are coming. March is not far away.
GB

going home now...

photo February 2012: grethe bachmann

two landscapes just before the town Odder. 

.....

A Summer Visit to Vallø Castle Park

Entrance to castle yard.

green-veined cabbage

 













In the summer-season is it lovely to visit one of the many fine castle parks in the country. I like to walk in a pretty park with soft green lawns and old trees - and there is always a shady place with a bench in the warm sun. In the park at Vallø Castle are many fine and beautiful old trees and also rare trees, like a gingko tree, which I had never seen before. And others, foreign to the Danish landscape, like Hjertetræ, (Cersiphyllum, commonly called Katsura, from Japan and China), Vingevalnød,  (Caucasian wingnut); ægte Tulipantræ (Liriodendron tulipifera = American tuliptree, yellow poplar) Manna-ask (Manna-ash) and many more. In the castle moat were yellow water-lily and flowering rush. A heron stood beside the little duck-house, which was far too small for him, but I suppose he was waiting for a fish. Some ducks were swimming among the water-lilies, sometimes  almost walking upon their large leaves. A green-veined cabbage and a red admiral butterfly were seen. The bees were humming in the mid-day sun, and it was a lovely place to be.

ducks among yellow water-lilies

Red Admiral

flowering rush

Heron in the moat

  

 

The park lies like a pretty frame around the castle. It was landscaped in the 1700s in French style and from that time are still some old  yew trees behind one of the lakes. They were plant out  in order to give shelter to the orangeries. Later was the park changed into an English landscape park . At that time it was fashion to collect rare trees in the parks.

 


The Vallø estate is actually one large coherent landscape, where extensive fields, solitary trees and lime avenues alternate with forests and meadows. It is one of Denmark's prettiest manor landscapes with a castle, a castle-town, an impressive park and a deer park, which was totally listed in 1981. The Renaissance castle was built by Mette Rosenkrantz in the 1580s. South of the castle, which was bought by the king in 1708 and in 1739 made into a royal residence for daughters of the nobility, lies a small town with yellow-chalked employee-homes. Here is Vallø Castle-Inn and the old horse-stable, which is a history-museum of the castle and the local area.

Valløs history is known back to the 1300s. In 1708 bought Frederik IV Vallø og gave it to his wife of "left hand", the later queen Anna Sophie Reventlow. After the king's death was Anna Sophie banished to Clausholm castle, and the new king Christian VI transferred Vallø to his queen Sophie Magdalene. In 1737 founded the queen Vallø Stift (diocese). The original instrument of foundationh was to help and support unmarried daughters of the danish nobility, who were registered in the diocese.

Vallø castle is the natural center of the diocese. As the castle looks today its history goes back to the middle of the 1500s. In 1893 was a castle fire caused by a candle, no one was seriously hurt but incredible cultural values burst into flames. The walls of the castle were not damaged, but everything else burnt out.

Overgrown moat

 


 

































The rebuilding of the castle lasted 10 years. The red castle-section, which was earlier a royal residence, has now 9 apartments for the ladies of the diocese. The white building (The White Stift) , which held all the apartment for the ladies, is now furnished in only two apartments.

Castle Inn

In the castle town

   
Close to the castle is the castle town with a Castle Inn and a museum in the old horse stable, which shows an exhibition of the history of the castle and the local area. Nearby is a fine camping place with cabins,  close to the sea and to the town Køge. The park is open to visitors from 8.00 till sunset. The castle is not open to visitors, since it is a private home, but the castle yard is open for visitors between 10.00-18.00. there is a parking place east of the castle.  

Source: Politikens store Danmarksbog; Se dit land Danmark, Vallø Stift.  

photo Vallø July 2007: grethe bachmann