Page 34 - Растения Сахалинской области в легендах и мифах

there a miracle came. The ripe seed balls opened to let the seeds gold

powder cloud up. It covered the beast with a thick veil and that’s it —
no beast in sight. Now the black forest was getting greener and greener.
Birds were singing, grasshoppers chirring. The girl was happy. She
thanked the fox deity for help and promised to feed it and its family
for all their life days. Then she hurried to the village to get the people
happy news. But the village looked empty. Not a soul around; the

deserted houses were being ruined, mossy. The girl realised that while
she’d been staying in the Lower World, the earth had counted plenty
of years. She grieved and burst out crying. Then she ran back to the
Frog mountain and said, «Let me in the Lower World, Frog. There
is no home for me on the earth». She laid down on the sun heated
stone and the Frog swallowed her and let her down the Lower World.
And the stone is still keeping the hollow that echoes the shaman girl’s
shape. They say, anyone lying down in the hollow with a heart’s

desire is going to get the shaman girl’s help. The desire will
come true. Will it? Who knows? But nowadays the Frog mountain
slopes can show people a wonderful lily that is in blossom only once,
but losing its bloom, it spreads around the golden seeds promising new
life. A rare flower as it is, isn’t it miraculous?

Lonicera tolmatchevii

(Lonicera tolmatchevii Pojark)

Deciduous shrub, 1.5–2 m tall. Shoots
are tetrahedral. Leaves are simple, whole,
opposite-sided. Leaf blades are elliptical
or ovateelliptical, 6–8 cm long, 4–5 cm
wide, pale green. Lemon-yellow flowers
are combined in inflorescences that sit
in the axils of 1–4 pairs of lower leaves.
Fruits are spherical loose shiny bitter black
berries, with small dark gray seeds.
Regressive relict endemic of specific
habitats. Found in the floodplain forests
of the middle reaches of the river Tym
and the lower reaches of its tributaries in
the area from the village Uskovo to the
village Nysh and middle reaches of the
rivers Uanga, Bolshoy Vagis, Ievleva, off
the coast of the Tatar Strait (Tymovskiy,
Nogliki and Okhinskiy districts).

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