Impossible to describe this beauty ... Have you ever wandered through a lilac, purple or pink field? We are talking about heather. What a smell this amazing bush of immortality emits! Every tourist wants to see moor fields in Scotland. They surprise with their asceticism and modesty, brightness and depth of shades. The Scots nationally are the mauve heaths that dissolve in the emerald green of the fields. Well, let's try to describe heather fields in more detail. Pictures in the article will show you all their charm.
Amazing plant - heather
Three quarters of all the world's thickets of lilac shrubs account for Scotland. The ancient inhabitants of this country believed that God himself decided to plant a honey plant on the hillsides, where cold winds walk. Graceful flowers with a bewitching smell were given as a reward to heather.
Heather is called an amazing evergreen shrub. It has narrow tetrahedral leaves, delicate small flowers resembling miniature bells. If you look closely at a separate branch, then the soul is filled with admiration. Leaflets and flowers are very small, but there are a lot of them, so they resemble pinkish clouds in the meadows. Photos of heather fields prove that once you get there, you will plunge into the atmosphere of honey aroma and anxious buzzing of bees. I would like to recall the words from the ballad of Robert Stevenson about an amazing plant:
From heather drink
Forgotten a long time ago.
And he was sweeter than honey,
Drunker than wine.
In boilers it was cooked
And drank the whole family
Baby Medovars
In caves underground.
Heather is a flowering plant, but when it blooms, it looks like some kind of conifer. Short and small leaves resemble the needles of cypress, juniper, spruce. For the winter, the plant does not drop its needles. They can remain on the bushes for several years, remaining green in the winter. Sometimes lilac inflorescences peep out from under the snow. After all, the flowering of heather fields lasts more than two months. Dried flowers tend not to change color.
Beautiful heather legend
There is one old Scottish legend. Once upon a time, God erected impregnable cliffs, endless wastelands and hills in this country. The Lord still really wanted to settle oaks, roses, and honeysuckle in Scotland. But these plants did not want to live here. The land seemed too harsh to these fastidious cultures.
Then God turned to a modest undersized shrub - heather. As a reward, he gave the plant the power of an oak tree, the fragrance of honeysuckle, the tenderness and sweetness of a rose. For the Scots, the bush became a kind of mascot. Residents of the northern country are confident that heather fields will bloom as long as Scotland exists.
Heather Fields in England
Scotland is an autonomous region of Great Britain, that is, England. In the northern part of this region is a national park - Yorkshire heather fields. The beauty of the scenery in the area is simply mesmerizing. Many artists were inspired by the local steep mountains and lakes spread in the valleys.
In August, Wales, Yorkshire parks, Brighton, the foothills of the lakes of Scotland are covered with lilac-pink. It is here that the largest lake in England is located - Windermere. Around him stretches a purple-violet "carpet" that seems drawn from afar. In the wasteland, where heather grows, there are very few other representatives of the flora. He loves friable, acidic soil mixed with white sand. There is little potassium, nitrogen, and phosphorus in this soil.
How is heather applied in Scotland?
A thousand years ago, ancient Celtic tribes used this plant. Roofs of houses were covered with dry stems, weaved all kinds of household utensils from them, stained skin, fabrics in yellow. And for local sheep this is the only food. Today we learned how to make fodder flour from heather straw, which surpasses any other in its useful qualities.
A huge magical power lurks in the plant. In pagan times, they were driven away from the homes of evil spirits. Many Scottish national holidays can not do without decorating houses with heather twigs. The plant also serves to create a variety of aromatic potions.
Use of Sweet Nectar
From July to late autumn, one can observe the generous and abundant flowering of pinkish-lilac heather fields, intoxicating with honey aroma. A large number of bees flies to the vast fields of this beautiful honey plant. In August, many beekeepers place hundreds of their hives close to heathlands. Heather - the main honey plant of Scotland. Arid or rainy weather does not interfere with the isolation of sweet nectar.
Heather honey has a lot of minerals and proteins. Sweet honey nectar has a tart taste and amazing aroma. The taste of honey after several years of storage becomes even more expressive and unique. Heather nectar is added to the famous Scottish liquor "Drambuy". The drink has a very complex composition: seasoned whiskey, mountain herbs, heather honey. A traditional Scottish strong beer, ale, is also prepared from heather.
Making jewelry from plant stems
Heather contains many organic acids, complex phenolic compounds, alkaloids, and minerals. This allows the plant to be widely used in medicine. It has a diaphoretic, disinfectant, calming, sleeping pill, wound healing effect. Aromatic and healthy tea is prepared from the end branches of heather.
Shrub wood can also serve as material for jewelry production. From the woody stems of heather in the Scottish town of Pitlochry make beautiful souvenirs.
One small Scottish company managed to patent a plant wood processing technology. This allowed us to make jewelry with a beautiful design. The Scots call them heathergems. Special processing of heather allows you to create the most fantasy patterns. First, the natural material is pressed into blocks, and then fancy figures are cut out of them, polished, varnished, framed in silver. Each such product reflects the exquisite palette of colors of nature in Scotland.
Heather fields in Russia
In the middle zone of Europe there are no such open spaces where moorlands could be located. In Russia, small thickets of plants are found in the European part, Eastern and Western Siberia. It is there that it is found on the edges of pine forests, on rocky slopes, peat bogs.
Modern breeders have bred heather cultivars. In the Moscow region, as well as other regions of the country, they are decorated with rock gardens. Specialists bred shrubs with different colors of inflorescences. White heather is associated with protection, fulfillment of desires. The lavender color of the plant is associated with admiration and loneliness. Purple heather symbolizes beauty. A bunch of pink flowers you can wish good luck.