In the enchanting world of botanical wonders, the Swan Flower, scientifically known as Globba sessiliflora, stands out as a captivating and delicate species.

Globba sessiliflora, also referred to as the Swan Flower, is a tropical and subtropical plant native to Southeast Asia, particularly Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia. The common name “Swan Flower” derives from the uncanny resemblance of its flowers to the elegant necks of swans.

Globba sessiliflora typically grows from rhizomes, which are underground stems. The plant forms clumps and can reach heights of 1 to 2 feet.

The plant’s leaves are long, lance-shaped, and feature an attractive dark green color. The leaves grow in pairs along the stem, creating a striking visual effect.

The flowers are primarily small and tubular, but the most captivating part of the plant is the unique, pure white, or pale pink bracts that encase the flowers. These bracts extend outward, creating the graceful swan-like appearance.

Globba sessiliflora has historical significance in traditional medicine and culinary practices. In various Southeast Asian cultures, parts of this plant have been used for their potential medicinal properties and as a culinary ingredient.

Ariopsis peltata is an annual herb distributed in India and Western malaysia. It has beautiful heart shaped ‘peltate’ leaves, hence the species name – peltata. Peltate means the petiole is attached to the middle of the leaf instead of the margin like most plants have.

These plants grow in gregarious groups and it is a sight to behold! Beautiful shield shaped leaves covering a cliff on the roadside.

The plant belongs to the family Araceae. A personal favorite for me .

The plant is usually terrestrial, but can also grow as epiphytes and lithophytes when conditions are favorable.

It has a globose tuber and the leaves and inflorescence rise from the tuber which lies under soil surface. The petioles are 8 to 20 cm long. Peduncle is 2 to 5 cm long and solitary.

The inflorescence is spadix. The spathe yellow or white and is about 3 cm long. The spike is about 2.5 cm long with depressed cavities for androecium. The male flowers are present towards the upper half of the spike while the female flowers are present towards the lower half of the spike. The stigma is 4 lobed.

Fruits are berries, 3 to 6 angled.

Seeds many, linear oblong, ridged longitudinally.

Impatiens elegans – the elegant balsam is a common, yet beautiful species of Balsam found in the Western Ghats of India. It is during the bountiful monsoon months these beautiful plants erupt in abundance and decorate the forest floor, streams and small waterfalls that run through the forests with pretty pink flowers.

Taxonomy

Order : Ericales

Family : Balsaminaceae

Genus : Impatiens

Species : elegans

Distribution

It is found only in the two states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala of India and nowhere else in the world. It grows above the elevation of 1200 meters above sea level and is found up to 1800 meters above sea level. Impatiens elegans is endemic to the Southern Western Ghats. They are found only to the south of Palghat pass. Their range starts from the Nelliyampathy and Anamalai hills and extends up to Agasthiyamalai Hills in the South.

Description

Habit and Habitat

It is a herb that grows up to a height of 30 to 40 cm. It grows near streams, on rocks constantly dripping with water, in the forest floor among leaf litter where it is constantly moist. It prefers to grow in cool, shaded, damp places of the forest where it gets almost a constant dripping of water. Thus, moist evergreen forests occurring at elevations above 1200 MSL support this plant. Wherever the conditions are just right for its survival, it grows in abundance and in huge colonies!

Stem

The stem is erect and branched. The stem roots whenever a node touches the soil. The stem is glabrous, i.e., without hairs. The stem is usually translucent, like glass and succulent. If you crush the stem, it will be very watery which suggests that the plant needs abundant water to thrive well.

Leaves

Leaves are ovate, cordate (heart-shaped at the base). The leaf margin is crenate (with curved tooth) with incurved bristles. The leaves are arranged in an alternate manner on the stems. The leaves may be hairy on nerves on the upper surface and pale and hairless on the lower surface.

Flowers

Each peduncle bears 3 to 5 flowers in short umbels or short raceme like inflorescence. The flowers are about 2.5 cm across, pale pink to pink with a purple center. Bracts are ovate-lanceolate, tapering towards the end and recurved. The lateral sepals are ovate with a green ridge ending in an acumen (a sharp tapering point).

The lip (you have to turn the flower behind to see this) is boat-shaped, very small. The flower lacks a spur. This is an important character to distinguish Impatiens elegans from Impatiens cordata which has a spur. Other than this, both the plants look exactly the same. You can differentiate both these species with the absence and presence of spur (a tail-like appendage that extends from the lip) respectively.

Fruits

Fruits are inflated capsules with seeds. The capsules are ovoid, elliptical, ridged, beaked, bulged in the middle, green, hairless, about 1.2 cm in length. The seeds are sub-spherical and hairy.

When mature, these are ready to burst anytime just with a light touch. This can even be done by a raindrop! The capsule bursts catapulting the seeds away from the mother plant.

Conservation status and threats

Impatiens elegans is an endangered plant where it faces threats from loss of habitats. The habitats in which this plant grows are unfortunately best suited for tea and coffee plantations. There is huge pressure from the private tea plantations extending their area by destroying their habitat. These delicate plants already face huge pressure from climate change, failing monsoons and lack of pollinators, poor seed germination, flowers and leaves eaten by herbivore insects, and more from nature! Destruction of habitats is yet another death blow to the survival of these plants. It is necessary to preserve their habitats and preserve these species…

More Photos!

References and Further Reading

1. Valparai Plant Trip – Happy Botanist
2. Impatiens elegans – Flowers of India
3. A research article on the reproductive biology of Impatiens elegans

Occurrence:

The Shola forests are generally said to be found in altitudes above 2000 meters of sea-level. Although they are found from altitudes higher than 1600 meters. Shola forests are native only to the Southern Western Ghats. They are found only in the high altitude mountains of the states Karnataka, Kerala, and Tamilnadu. Nowhere else in the world exist such a kind of forest. There are several hypotheses that explain such a unique occurrence of grasslands and forest mosaics. Some suggest the grasslands were mad-made and controlled by fire and grazing. This theory also suggests that the periodic fires ensured that no trees grew in the mountain tops restricting them only to the depressions between the mountains.

Another theory suggests that the reason why the forests could not survive the mountain tops was due to the excessive frost that exists there. The frost does not allow seeds of the Shola species to germinate or the seedlings cannot survive the extreme frost. The leaves of the plants get damaged and they cannot sustain there. Whereas, in the depressions between the hills, the damage caused by the frost is a lot less compared to the open hill-tops. The Shola trees can grow and sustain well there.

Shola forests on Chembra peak, Wayanad, Kerala, India.

Flora:

The grasslands consist of different species of grass and mostly the following species are seen widely,

• Chrysopogon zeylanicus
• Cymbopogon flexuosus
• Arundinella ciliata
• Arundinella mesophylla
• Arundinella tuberculata
• Themeda tremula
• Sehima nervosum.

Due to high isolation and unique climatic conditions, the Shola forests are characterized by high endemism. The species of plants and animals found here are native to this region (this climatic region to be more specific) and such species cannot be found anywhere else in the world.

Shola forests of Brahmagiri Hills, Karnataka, India

Fauna:

These forests are rich in endemic species of animals where some species of animals have adapted to this unique landscape and are found nowhere else in this world. Several amphibian species are found only here and a few mammal species and primates are native to the southern Western Ghats. Some of them are,

Large animals like Tiger, Elephants, Leopard, and Gaurs are also found to inhabit the grassland-shola complex.

Vulnerability and Current status:

These forests are extremely vulnerable to several threats. There are several reasons for the diminishing shola-grassland complex. They are,

• The Shola tree species have one of the lowest regeneration rates. They do not get established very soon. They are generally slow-growing and need more time to establish themselves and are very sensitive to climatic conditions which make them very vulnerable. Moreover, most Shola trees produce drupaceous fruits which are difficult to produce more seeds and there is less way to disperse them successfully.
• These forests and grasslands are being cleared for agriculture. These forests are relatively easy to clear as they constitute mainly of grasslands and trees are generally stunted with no timber value.
• Construction of hill stations is another major threat to these forests. These forests usually exist in higher elevations, these places, unfortunately, have a suitable climate to be made as Hill stations and tourist spots. Several hill stations in Southern India were established after the destruction of thousands of acres of shola forests. Some of them are, Ooty, Kodaikanal, Munnar, Coorg, Valparai, Kotagiri, Kodanad, Megamalai.
• Mining activities are increasing in the Western Ghats for various reasons like Bauxite, Gypsum, Granites, and various other rocks and minerals. This leads to habitat destruction of the flora and fauna of the Western Ghats.
• hydroelectric projects and dams are a great threat as it submerges thousands of acres of forests. The Government even does such folly and the dams are usually given up after a certain period of time as the reservoirs become of no use after prolonged silt deposition. Forests cannot get established even after the dam becomes inoperational as the silt is not nutritious enough for the forest species and the area remains a barren land.
• South Indian tea is famous all over the world. This may sound like a great thing. But we are paying a huge loss for this fame and money. Millions of acres of hill-tops and slopes which were once covered in grasslands and shola forests are now barren tea plantations. They will just be green deserts in the nature conservationist’s eyes.

Tea plantations and Shola forests beside each other! – A beautiful irony

After all the above known and may unknown threats, there still exist patches of shola forests here and there. They thrive in silence in the protection of national forests and wildlife sanctuaries.

 Why are they important?

Why am I shouting so far that they are important? They are important because,

• The shola forests have high water retention capacity than any other soil. These forests absorb the Monsoon rains and they retain them within their soil. The retained water is then slowly released in the year’s course and they form small streams. These streams join to form larger streams that form rivers that feed the entire civilizations in the plains down.
• They are the source of water in rivers live Cauvery, Thamirabarani, Vaigai. These rivers are perennial and they never go dry like the Ganges in North India. River Ganges is perennial because it is fed by a melting glacier all year-round. There is no ice in the Western Ghats and yet these rivers manage to supply water all round the year. The reason behind this is the presence of Shola forests.
• They are the reason for moderate climates for several cities along their foothills. Example – Coimbatore, a city that is near the Western Ghats in Western Tamil Nadu. The city unlike other cities in Tamilnadu enjoys a moderate climate all year round.
• They are home to several endemic species of plants and animals. Endemic means that they can exist only in that specific region and not found in any other part of the world. Without these forests, they lose their habitat and they will eventually go extinct.

Shola forest and grassland complex in Grass Hills National Park, Valparai, Tamilnadu, India.

Unique Characters:

Sky Islands – The shola forests form unique regions called “Sky Islands” which occur only at higher elevations are usually isolated and separated from each other and the lowland terrain. The distance of separation may be from a few meters to several hundred kilometers. Each sky island may have a unique climatic condition. This leads to great endemism in plants and animals. They adapt themselves to that climatic condition and they evolve there. As a result, they cannot live outside the climatic region where they are supposed to exist! Surprising nature!

Examples of Sky Islands – Patches of forests that are separated by grasslands have unique characteristics!

Climatic climax – The shola forest and grassland complex has been described as climatic climax vegetation with forest regeneration and expansion restricted by climatic conditions such as frost or soil characteristics. The soil characteristics widely vary between the Shola forest and that of the grasslands surrounding it. The soil of the grasslands are usually poor in nutrition and water retention and hence cannot support the shola species. Grass can grow even in soils with the lowest nutritive values. While the soil of the shola forests are highly nutritive and they have high water retention capacity. The top layer of the soil mainly is made of peat and leaf debris which when removed is very difficult to form again. This adds to the vulnerability of these forests.

Conclusion:

Shola forests are some of the unique gifts that were given to human beings. But we never know the value of things unless we damage it so much that we realize we cannot live without it. This is what is happening in this case and I hope there are steps taken to conserve these forests lately. But they are not enough to repair the huge damage we have caused to them. More awareness needs to be created among the public to join hands to save the unique gift given to us. I hope the Government and people will one day understand these heavens and they will once again regain their cover over the Western Ghats.

I hope this was helpful. Let me know your ideas and thoughts in the comments!