Category Archives: Flowers

If you drive on country roads in Crete in June you are bound  to notice the spectacular Verbascum macrorum growing along the roadsides. The plant can reach heights of up to 1.5m and is widespread in Crete and the southern … Continue reading →

To see Crocus sieberi, one of Crete’s most beautiful endemic flowers you will need to go quite high up in the mountains. This spring crocus flowers right at the edge of melting snow. You might find it as low as … Continue reading →

Asphodelus ramosus, the White Asphodel or Branched asphodel, is very common in the Cretan landscape from March to June. This tall flower (it can be well over a meter in height) is found from sea level to about 1000m.

Arisarum vulgare (also called Friar’s Cowl because of its shape resembling…a monk’s cowl) is small flower of the Arum family which can grow in large colonies. It is not at all a showy flower, preferring to hide in moist, shady … Continue reading →

Sternbergia sicula (or more precisely Sternbergia lutea subsp. sicula) is not found in the West of Crete but is the most common Sternbergia in the rest of the island. It grows in open stony places, olive groves and phrygana and … Continue reading →

Autumn is a tough season for a “Flower of the month” feature. After the long dry summer Crete doesn’t have much of a variety of flowers and I already covered the most common ones in 2013 and 2012. But there … Continue reading →

There is not much flowering in Crete at the peak of the summer so I needed to go high up in the mountains to find a suitable candidate (thyme and sea daffodils which would be far more common were already … Continue reading →

Acantholimon androsaceum is another pincushion mountain flower with an impossibly long Latin name. It’s also one of the most beautiful flowering plant that you can see in Crete in summer. An endemic of Crete, Acantholimon androsaceum is not exactly rare … Continue reading →

Whilst the vegetation is drying out in the lower parts of Crete, flowers are starting to come out in the mountains.  Astragalus angustifolius is an impressive ‘hedgehog’ plant that forms large spiky cushions. It is found in all the mountains … Continue reading →

Paeonia clusii or Cretan peony is one of the most spectacular flowers of Crete. Endemic to Crete and Karpathos, it flowers in April and May. It’s not especially rare but there aren’t many places where you can find it either. … Continue reading →