Alaska Lupine saves the day

Iceland is so unusual.  There are so many stories to tell, I cannot even begin.  So I am starting with a small bite about a lovely plant.  I hope I will find it in myself to discuss more about the geology, birds, landscape but for now--here is a good story without a final outcome.

The flowering plant above is an import from Alaska.  Earlier in the year, it showed fields and fields of blue but we are almost in winter now so only a few sheltered blooms are left.  Besides being a plant family I love and being from a place I love, it turns out that this plant is contributing significantly to the ecosystem in Northeast Iceland.  

Good or bad contribution--depends on who you ask of course.

Iceland is pretty far from the center of the earth's population centers (66 degrees north; 15 degrees east) but is warmer than one would expect because it is bathed by the North Atlantic current, an extension of the Gulf Stream.  The sea does not freeze here. Plants colonized the island after the receding of the last glaciation about 10,000 years ago.  But it is a harsh climate--still has glaciers, many volcanoes, great rushing floods when glaciers are melted by volcanoes.  Pretty far north and isolated from its nearest neighbors.  How can plants and animals get here and survive all that?  It is tough.

Arctic fox is the only native land animal, polar bears have reached Iceland on floating ice occasionally.  Neither of these brought plant seeds.  Birds did though-many kinds of birds.  Not much is likely to have arrived on the wind or in currents.  What came, came in birds.

Before people, basically two kinds of trees: birch and rowan.  Grasses, mosses.  Mainly the place was forest or tundra or sand and rock. The variety of plants we see further south where the glaciers ended, such as the Burren, Ireland never were found here. Legumes, big seeded pants like peas, alfalfa never made it here via the bird seed-distribution force.

Am I ever going to get to our hero, Alaska lupine?  

Soon.

People arrived starting in about the 700's and the first settlers known are from 781-ish.  They brought, sheep, cattle, grain.  By 1000 when writing starts, there were about 80,000 people on the island.  All were farmers--grazing sheep, horses and cattle, growing barley.  Of course they used the fish and other resources and life was pretty good.

To farm and graze, they cut the forests almost completely eventually.  With the cutting and burning, the soil was very fertile for quite some time and there was a period of warm climate. Sheep grazing took care of the rest of the pesky vegetation creating a sheep desert.  

Farmers began to grow grass more systematically but Iceland never recovered its vegetation and fertility. Climate cooled. Starvation periods came and went; population declined.

Scientific agriculture in the 19th and 20th C's, identified the relationship between nitrogen-fixing plants (legumes like beans and peas) and grassy plants (barley, wheat, hay).  Many other parts of the world used this knowledge to rotate crops, combine crops or otherwise increase yields.  But, here, there are NO native nitrogen-fixing plants and most of the world's legumes will not grow here.

Now, our hero.  

Alaska lupine is a legume which thrives on terrible soil and happily lives in a cold, harsh climate.

In 1885 it was introduced to Iceland and had a beneficial effect on crop production.  In the 1960's it was spread by the forestry department in their efforts to stabilize soil and diminish erosion which has been a terrible problem for centuries.

In the two photos below, you can see the empty sandy soil that lupine is colonizing. There are miles of this gravel/sand/rock.

What could be the downside?
Lupine is so hardy that smaller native grasses cannot compete.  They are overshadowed and crowded out.  You can see them above with the lupine.

Judgement on Lupine: Hero or Bully remains undecided.  There is some public cry for reining it in somehow to give the littler plants a way to compete.  Others note that the native grasses are scarce because of grazing, erosion and general harsh climate.  Farmers are pleased to use the plant especially with crops but must limit their sheep's exposure to it as it is too rich for a steady diet.

I really like lupine in general and it looks beautiful here on gravelly hillsides.  I am somewhat on the hero side.

Iceland has been so changed by human use that it is hard to think about a natural landscape.  Even where forests are re-growing, outside species are mixed with the birch and rowan.  The soil lost to erosion is so significant, intervention via lupine seems useful.

But, think of the tiny little grass, carried here by birds centuries ago.  It may need some nurturing too.

Update from southern Iceland on Saturday, Sept 5:
No lupine to be seen.  This area is much closer to the glacier and mountains stick up into the glacier.  There is some but much less of the glacier gravel outfill which was so prevalent in the north.  Large areas of varied plans--not sure if they are native.  Also much agriculture--mainly grazing, hay production and some grain.

From the Vantajokul  Vanta Glacier) Visitor Center, I learn that there are only about 5000 vascular plants in Iceland--not lichen, moss. This is significantly fewer than anywhere else.  No native conifers, for example.  There are mountains which rise up in the middle of the glacier ice fields which have never been impacted by humans.  These are protected now as part of the national park and are monitored by scientists.  100 species of flowering plants have been identified there; 200 on some of the lower but protected slopes.