This post is also available in: Italiano (Italian)

In this reserve, there is an exceptional variety of different environments and biodiversity.
Bosco della Giumenta and the cork oak forest on Mount Coniglio are part of the reserve, as well as several mountain pastures and some wetlands such as the “margi”; the latter is where the waters coming from the peaks are collected in pools, small swamps or ponds (the highest is located at over 4.429 ft above sea level).

Bosco della Giumenta develops upward at 4.429-4.593 and is a very evocative place; in fact, due to humidity, beech trees are covered with thick moss and lichens on their trunks and branches, with small mushrooms peeping out.

The vegetation is very thick and doesn’t allow the sunlight into the undergrowth, which is thus scarcely developed. Only spring cyclamens and Peruvian pepper trees, slender evergreen shrubs that begin to bloom in the winter, can survive in these peculiar and most hostile conditions.
In the areas where the old beech trees have already started decomposing, however, the stronger sunlight allows the development of holly, dog roses and elm leaf blackberry. Near the beech forest, there is also a thick oak wood (Turkey oaks and downy oaks) where common hawthorns, blackthorn, chestnut trees and maples thrive, often covered by leafy lichens.

Source text and photos:
https://www.guidasicilia.it/route/la-riserva-naturale-di-sambughetti-e-campanito/1001389

This post is also available in: Italiano (Italian)