Bulletin - Summer 1994 - North American Rock Garden Society

array of alpine plants we saw grewwell below treeline, southwest of theHigh Tatras on a 4,000'-high plateaupeppered with sink-holes and icecaves. The Muranska Planina is part ofa large "protected landscape/' similarto our national forests, established in1977 and taking in about 5,000 squaremiles. It is administered by only tenemployees compared to 2,000 in theHigh Tatra National Park. This is thewildest part of the two republics, thelast place where wolves, bears, lynxes,and wild boars still roam. It wasempty of people. Once away from thefew farms and villages, we saw only acouple of woodcutters—indeed, topass down several of the lumberroads, we first had to unlock woodengates.We stayed in the rather impoverishedtown of Revuka, in a hotelwhich only two weeks earlier hadbeen sold by the State to private owners.We were their first guests. In fact,the hotel wasn't really open yet, andthey were still cleaning the wall-towallcarpets by scrubbing them withsoap and water in the parking lot.Needless to say, the carpets didn't fitvery well when they were nailed backdown. No matter, our hosts couldn'thave worked harder to make our staypleasant. After the first morning, theybought an espresso machine especiallyto satisfy the American demand forbreakfast coffee, and one evening agypsy musician accompanied ourhilarious attempts—under Frank'senthusiastic guidance—to dancepolkas and the csardas.Our daytime guide was Dr. PeterTuris, the young chief botanist for theMuranska, and right away he took usto where the main road (beautifullyasphalted) rises to cut through a limestoneformation. The white fringedpinks of Dianthus hungaricus splayedfrom the rock; a colony of Primulaauricula had seeded into the crevices.In a glade in the woods across theroad, near a stand of golden Trolliusaltissimus, another limestone outcroppingwas covered with moss in whichcolonies of the delicate, pale blue harebell,Campanula cochlearifolia, grewnext to Pinguicula vulgaris, a moisturelovermore often seen in bogs. Fartheralong the main road, where a hair-pinturn sliced through heavy clay banks,the gorgeous pink pincushions ofScabiosa lucida waved on foot-highstems next to compact clumps ofCampanula carpatica. The latter hadrather congested foliage and hugelavender saucers on short stems andlookedclose to the form called"turbinata."The next day, Frank inched the busup a precipitous lumber road andparked it in an open meadow fragrantwith thyme. From there, the able-bodiedwalked up a trail lined withPinguicula and Moneses uniflora, theround leaves of Soldanella hungarica(slightly larger than S. carpatica, whichwe'd seen growing in the acid Tatras)carpeting the adjacent deciduous forestfloor. After crossing a field studdedwith newly planted conifers, weducked under some larch branchesand crawled (at least I, with no headfor heights, did!) out to the edge of acliff. And there they were: 8"-highshrubs with narrow evergreen leavesand with every accessible seed headcovered with a little white bag. Dr.Turis is conducting research onDaphne arbuscula, trying to discoverwhy it is so rare in the wild. Thedaphne, as are many of the otheralpines growing on the Muranskabelow treeline, is a relict of the IceAge, but it is also an endemic andindeed, according to Dr. Turis, is fairlywell restricted to this particular cliff.Sometimes it is listed as coming fromHungary, but that in itself is a politicalOn the Track of Daphne arbuscula 167