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| Devil’s Claw (Physoplexis comosa) |
Tree-trunk section |
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| Primula |
Lichens display |
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| Timber fungi |
Mushrooms display |
Lessinia Botanical Museum
The Botanical Museum is one of the museums in Lessinia. It was opened in 1993 and it displays the flora of Lessinia, particularly that of the Molina Waterfall Park. About 300 species typical of the Lessinia are on show: among them, several orchids. The Museum is dedicated to the illustrious Molina citizen Mr. Giovanni Zantedeschi, physician and botanist. Born in 1773, interested in botanic, he published about ten works on plants and flowers. To thank him for his studies, the Sprengel dedicated him a plant of the Araceae family, calling it Zantedeschia. Belonging to the Aethiopica variety, the Zantedeschia is an ornamental plant known as Calla lily.
The visit to the Museum starts from an introductory room where a map shows the exact location of the Molina village in the Lessinia Park. Following, a poster explains how vegetation changes with altitude, establishing a number of vegetation strata. In the lower strata we can find cultivations (basal area); going up, we enter the “pubescens oak” level (600-900m a.m.s.l.). The vegetation here is constituted mainly by broad-leaved plants such as pubescens oaks, hop hornbeams and chestnuts. Going further up, we find the beech level (1000-1400m a.m.s.l.), where climatic conditions are cooler and the first conifers such as the spruce, the silver fir and the Scotch pine start to appear. As altitude increases, beeches disappear and the vegetation is constituted only by conifers, and, higher up, by twisted shrubs such as the mugho mountain pine and the rock rhododendron. Finally, at about 1800m a.m.s.l., we find the alpine grassland with grassy plants; the climatic conditions are very rigid and tree-like plants cannot survive due to the cold and strong winds.
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