same, same, not same

in my mind, the dry and prickly landscape here in southern france is in almost complete contrast to the moist and lush (summer) landscape of my native home in minnesota.  interestingly, i continue to hold onto that image even though i am greeted almost daily with species that exist in both locations…”hon, look at all the staghorn sumac” i said just yesterday as were leaving the city of montpellier and merging onto the autoroute. i did the same thing today, sitting under a linden tree …”hey, look at those seed pods..no wait, those are bracts…oh, of course, that’s a linden tree. duh.”  interestingly, our little village of Autignac sits at 43.5 degrees north latitude, and our home in minneapolis, minnesota sits at 45.0 degrees, and though they may share the occasional species, the remarkable thing is still how different they are, given their almost equal latitudes. and that has almost everything to do with the gulf stream, and the warm semitropical waters it carries north, to deliver to the atlantic coast of europe.

linden leaves/feuilles de tilleul