Poppy on Öland
27 May 2021
Nature & Outdoors

The flower round

Something you should look for in the budding season is the Arontorps rose. From the name, you can guess that it can be found near the place Arontorp, just south of Färjestaden. This yellow beauty is only found in a few places in Europe. Nunnedalen is a very popular excursion destination and here there is a rich species flora with the long-awaited spring flowers. In the areas around Resmo and Vickleby there are several good parking spaces and all you have to do is get out of the car or off the bike, and you are in the middle of the glory. Further north, at the entrance to Ekerum there is a beautiful and well-marked walking loop in the burgeoning oak forest in the area known as Halltorps Hage. If you are looking to see something really rare, this is where you should go. There are an unusually large number of red-listed species here. In the latter part of the budding season, Högenäs Orde, a couple of miles north of Borgholm, is a place where you can discover several orchids. Likewise, Karum's seriousness in central Öland with the famous Noah's Ark shipwreck is a good place for orchid scouting. If you want to be sure to see an orchid, a good tip is to go to Skogsbyallvaret, where the species richness is great and the area is easily accessible but has excellent parking spaces. Take part in some flower shops below!

 

Högenäs Orde

Few places are as lovely as Högenäs said. The changing water supply and a long tradition of grazing animals in the area have contributed to the diversity of habitats that flourish here. The limestone-rich grasslands provide a floral splendor with orchids such as Sant Per's keys and Adam and Eve. Follow the wet meadows and find St. John's wort, Bride's spur, Honey flower, Fly flower, Meadow cleaver and Mayflower. In the center of the reserve rises a ten meter high ridge from where you have a magnificent view of the Baltic Sea and the surrounding landscape.

 

Södra Greda Löväng

Södra Greda Löväng has a rich flora and fauna due to the tree-bearing meadow that is cut annually. Lin the meadows of the low embankment in the west, the grassland flora is dry with species such as sheep's fescue, ax veronica, mountain thyme, sundew and yellow sedge. In the spring you can find here plenty of orchids, mainly Adam and Eve. In the east, the lands are healthy and moist, which allows you to see Brownwort. Majviva, Krissla and Blåtåtel. You can also see rare ticks on the oaks such as pale tick, oxtongue mushroom and saffron tick.

 

Halltorp's Garden

Visit Halltorp's pasture, which is considered one of the most species-rich areas in Sweden. In the nature reserve there are 13 giant oaks with a circumference of over 100 cm. In the spring, the orchids in the area bloom, including cypresses in beautiful colors on the southern leaf meadow. You can also see spring bulbs, goldenrod, toothroot and spring pea. In the summer you can enjoy the view of sweet clover, snake's tongue and castarun.

 

Karum's elves

Karum's nature reserve is Sweden's largest area for endangered field grass. In total, Karum has 54 hay meadows. The grounds at Karum are fine orchid grounds and in the area there is a barely 3 km long hiking trail called the Karumleden. Karum in central Öland is a unique farming landscape with traces from many different time periods from the Paleolithic onwards. On Karum's alvar, one of the few alvar areas in midland, the famous and well-visited shipwreck Noah's Ark is located. Orchid species such as Skogsnycklar, Sankt Pers nycklar and St. Johannes nycklar bloom in the reserve.

 

Arontorp

In Sweden, the beautiful plant grows only in Gotland and Öland. The plant is peaceful and very poisonous and only grows on calcareous soil, actually it belongs on the southern European steppes. The plant is also called arontorp rose, a name it naturally got after the village of Arontorp. In the reserve you will find it in a paddock in the western part of the area. The western part of the reserve consists of overgrown leaf meadows where oak, ash and elm with their leaf crowns provide a shady roof. The reserve is most beautiful in the spring when carpets of white sedges and blue sedges spread out. The spring flora also includes goldenrods, yellow sedges and the purple spring pea. Various warblers, thrushes and house finches sing most intensively in the spring until midsummer.

In Strandhagen in southern Öland, you will find it in the nearly one hectare beachside chalk grass area by Kalmarsund.

 

Great seriousness

Stora Alvaret, with its 26 hectares, is one of the world's largest elves. At Stora Alvaret, plants from all over the world meet. Here there are mountain plants such as buttercup and mountain carnation and southern European plants such as mountain crab (as you can see in the picture) and soapwort. There are also endemic species here, which occur only on Öland in the whole world, Öland's solsvände and alvar malört.

 

Albrunna grove

With Stora Alvaret to the east and the farmland at Kalmarsund to the west, Albrunna grove forms a lung, an oasis in the landscape. A spring visit to Albrunna grove offers floral splendor and an intense chorus of birds. On your hike, you will pass several protective defenses from the Second World War. The northern part of the reserve is home to a range of unusual fungi and lichens.

An Öland grove is something out of the ordinary. In the spring, the herbs hold court before ash, oak and the other deciduous trees close the canopy of the grove. The ground is covered with sedges in white and yellow, St. John's Wort and Dandelion contribute pink and violet. Until May, the grove offers formidable birdsong. The soundstage is almost deafening when blackcaps, house finches, various singers and thrushes hold a concert.

 

The Öland solstice

Did you know that Öland's solstice is Öland's landscape flower? It is smaller than the usual solstice and blooms around midsummer and thrives best on the alvarmark's gravel elms, where mountain crabs also thrive. In rare cases, you can find the solstice in sandy dunes.  

Find the flower shops