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wild flower
"Calanchi" |
On the other side from Mt. Citernella to Collicello, you can watch a sort of vegetable "concerto", in the sense that varying the orographic conformation of the hillside, you can pass from woods made of chestnut trees only, or turkey oaks or hombeams, to the typical mixed wood structures made of chestnut trees, turkey oaks, "roverella" oaks, hornbeams, maple trees and holm-oaks which remind us the nearby mediterranean bush. In such a small space you can really enjoy yourself, if you only reconstruct the whole pattem, starting from the geological past and arriving at the historic past which has strongly shaped the landscape but with such a natural dellcacy, that the primigenial structure was fully saved.
The corals and the madrepores that formed 180 million years ago the limestone of the ancient sea bottom, today are the base of the thin layers that keep alive this wide wooded mantle. It's the same limestone the men of the Middle Age used for building their houses, their churches, the same used for paving the squares and for erecting the numerous fllghts of steps.
Where the limestone ends and where is rich in ammonites and so reddish in colour to be called "rosso ammonitico", there the clay appears, especially on the southern slope, the one descending towards the Tiber. With the clay the components of the wood change. We pass from the mediter-ranean bush to a mixed wood with decid-uous trees with "roverella" oaks, british oaks, elms, maple trees and down in the valley, in the plain by the river. also with poplars, alders and willows. Of the ancient woods, now only a few relics remain here and there: the main part of the sudace is destined to an agricultural activivity of subsistence, mainly olive-groves. A growing similar to the one in some areas around Spoleto, "stolen" partly from the mediterranean bush, sometimes on terraced land, cultivated on calcareous soil but producing one of the most exquisite olive-oils in Italy.
The removal of the ancient woods and the conseguent agricultural activity favoured the life of a few settlements of some importance if we only consider the quality of the dwellings, but at the same time, due to some uncontrolled excesses, the rain-water has been allowed to erode the clay and to form gullies. This is not a good thing. This spells geological decay. Nevertheless, together with the olive trees, It is a particular feature of our landscape, a
mixture between hardness and sweetness.
Down in the Tiber valley, not suitable for settlements, but rather for an agriculture more intensive than the one up on the hill, the original nature has been always opposed to, also because of the caprices of the river, often modifying its course.
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