viburnum

 

On all the many viburnum (viburnum tinus) shrubs that are growing here you can see the dark blue "berries" at this time of the year. Especially after the rain theses beautiful, shiny fruits are delighting me. I find it very hard to actually capture the illuminance of their metallic colour.

The viburnum tinus is an evergreen shrub native to the Mediterranean.

In the end of February the viburnum will start to show its creamy-white fragrant blossom.

While some of the shrubs grow wild and are protected in Israel the viburnum is also widely used as ornamental plant in gardens- mainly because it is evergreen and can tolerate the dry and hot months. 

Most of the viburnum in our kibbutz are growing without irrigation - meaning that for around 5-7 months a year they don't get any water. 

This year we saw some of them suffer because of the unusual hot and dry month of September. Hopefully they will recover now during the rainy season.