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Summer

Caryophyllaceae

Pseudostellaria himalaica

by G & P Jürgens

(Franch.) Pax

BhutanPG2011 117
Bhutan Chogham, 3450m June
Bh2008 38 G66
Bhutan Dochu-La, 3000m April
Sikkim 2006 79 ergebnis
India West-Bengal, Kalipokkri 3100m, May

Description

Pseudostellaria himalaica (Franch.) Pax is a small woodland perennial of the Himalaya and adjacent ranges, distributed through Bhutan, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Afghanistan and south-western China, with a comparatively modest GBIF record of about 118 occurrences reflecting its inconspicuous habit. It grows in cool, shaded, humus-rich conditions: the floor of temperate broadleaf and conifer forest, mossy banks, Rhododendron understorey and damp rocky slopes. The illustrated material spans three localities and seasons, from Chogham in Bhutan at 3450 m in June and Dochu-La at 3000 m in April to Kalipokkri in West Bengal, India, at 3100 m in May, indicating a flowering period extending through spring and early summer in the temperate to lower subalpine zone.

The plant is a delicate, glabrous to sparsely hairy perennial arising from slender, fusiform to tuberous-thickened roots. The stems are weak, slender and ascending, bearing opposite, sessile to shortly petiolate, ovate to lanceolate leaves with entire margins. The flowers are of two kinds in the manner typical of Pseudostellaria: showy, chasmogamous flowers borne in the upper axils or terminally, with five free white petals (often bifid or notched) somewhat exceeding the five lanceolate sepals, ten stamens and a three-styled ovary; and inconspicuous, often petal-less cleistogamous flowers produced lower on the plant that self-fertilise. The fruit is a small capsule dehiscing by valves to release few seeds.

This taxon has frequently been treated as Pseudostellaria heterantha var. himalaica, reflecting its close affinity with the variable P. heterantha aggregate, and authors differ on whether to recognise it at species or varietal rank, as the source page name indicates. The combination of showy outcrossing flowers with reliably self-pollinating cleistogamous ones is a reproductive strategy that buffers seed-set in the short, cool growing season of shaded montane forest. The species is widespread if seldom abundant, and no specific conservation threat is recorded, though it depends on intact forest understorey.

Author: (Franch.) Pax · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China, Flora of Bhutan, Caryophyllaceae of the Himalaya (Majumdar)

Orobanchaceae

Pterygiella tenuisecta 

by GP Jürgens

(Bureau & Franch.) Pinto-Carr., E.Rico & M.M.Mart.Ort.

Bh09 414 P652
Bhutan Paro, 2500m June

Description

Pterygiella tenuisecta (Bureau & Franch.) Pinto-Carr., E.Rico & M.M.Mart.Ort. is a hemiparasitic annual herb of the Sino-Himalayan region, distributed through Bhutan, northern India and south-western China (notably Yunnan and Sichuan), with the GBIF dataset of roughly 883 occurrences also carrying determinations referable to material in Japan. Often treated under the name Phtheirospermum tenuisectum, it occupies open grassy slopes, forest margins, scrub and disturbed banks at montane elevations, where like other root-hemiparasites it attaches to the roots of neighbouring grasses and herbs while retaining functional green foliage. The illustrated plant was photographed at Paro in western Bhutan at around 2500 m in June, an elevation and season typical of its flowering in the temperate montane belt.

It is a slender, erect to ascending annual with branched, glandular-pubescent stems. The leaves are opposite below and may become alternate above, the blades pinnatisect to bipinnatisect with narrow, almost filiform ultimate segments, giving the foliage a finely divided, feathery appearance reflected in the epithet tenuisecta. The flowers are solitary in the upper leaf axils, shortly pedicellate, with a tubular, ribbed, glandular calyx of fused sepals. The corolla is yellow, two-lipped, the upper lip hooded and the lower three-lobed and spreading, enclosing four didynamous stamens. The fruit is a loculicidal, ovoid to oblong capsule containing numerous small seeds.

The species has been shuttled between several genera of the broomrape family, having been described in Gerardia and later placed in Phtheirospermum before molecular and morphological work supported its transfer to Pterygiella; the synonymy underlies the differing names on the source page. As a facultative hemiparasite it plays a part in regulating grassland community structure, drawing water and nutrients from hosts while contributing its own photosynthesis. No conservation concern is recorded, the plant being a widespread component of seasonally moist montane grasslands across its Sino-Himalayan range.

Author: (Bureau & Franch.) Pinto-Carr., E.Rico & M.M.Mart.Ort. · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China, Flora of Bhutan, Orobanchaceae phylogenetic studies (Pinto-Carrasco et al.)

Brassicaceae

Pycnoplinthopsis bhutanica

by GP Jürgens

Jafri 

BhutanPG2011 253
Bhutan Jule-Tso, 4000m June

Description

Pycnoplinthopsis bhutanica is a high-alpine crucifer endemic to the eastern Himalaya, recorded from Bhutan, Nepal and India, and one of the rarer plants in this group with only about 33 GBIF occurrences. It is confined to open alpine habitats — stony turf, screes, moraines and rock crevices — at very high elevations, generally around and above 4000 m. The plant photographed at Jule-Tso in Bhutan at about 4000 m in June represents its characteristic setting in cold, well-drained alpine ground near glacial lakes, flowering in early summer as the snow retreats.

The species is a small, cushion- or rosette-forming perennial herb with a stout, often woody taproot crowned by a dense tuft of leaves. The leaves are entire to slightly toothed, somewhat fleshy and crowded, frequently appressed to the ground. The flowers are borne close to the rosette on very short pedicels, with four white to pale lilac or pinkish petals arranged in the cruciform pattern typical of the family and six tetradynamous stamens. The fruit is a short silicula characteristic of the genus, retaining a persistent style and dehiscing to release the seeds.

Pycnoplinthopsis is a small Himalayan genus closely allied to Pycnoplinthus, both being dwarf, cushion-forming high-alpine Brassicaceae adapted to the harsh conditions of the upper alpine and subnival zone. The compact rosette habit, woody rootstock and reduced inflorescence are adaptations to cold, wind exposure and a brief growing season. As a narrow eastern Himalayan endemic of restricted, fragile high-elevation habitats, it is of biogeographic and conservation interest and potentially vulnerable to climate-driven contraction of the alpine zone, although it has not been formally assessed.

Author: Jafri · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China, Flora of Bhutan, Annotated Checklist of the Flowering Plants of Nepal, Al-Shehbaz systematics of Brassicaceae

Pyrolaceae

Pyrola asarifolia subsp. asarifolia

by GP Jürgens

n.n.

BhutanPG2011 732 01 01
Bhutan Haa-Valley, 2750m July

Description

Pyrola asarifolia subsp. asarifolia is a small evergreen perennial herb traditionally placed in the family Pyrolaceae, now usually treated within Ericaceae (subfamily Monotropoideae). It is a circumboreal taxon, and its GBIF records span North America, eastern Asia and the Himalaya, including the United States, Canada, Japan, China, India and Bhutan, reflecting a broad cool-temperate to boreal range. It grows in moist, shaded coniferous and mixed forest, on humus-rich, often mossy soils, generally between about 2,500 and 3,500 m in its Himalayan stations. The plant illustrated from the Haa Valley in western Bhutan at 2,750 m in July typifies this shaded, damp montane forest-floor habitat.

The species is a low, rosette-forming herb arising from a slender, creeping rhizome. The leaves are basal, long-petiolate, with rounded to broadly ovate or reniform, somewhat leathery and glossy blades that persist through the winter, the shape recalling that of Asarum and giving the epithet asarifolia. The flowering scape is erect and leafless, bearing a many-flowered raceme of nodding, cup-shaped flowers; these are pink to rose-purple, with five spreading petals, ten anthers opening by pores, and a long, characteristically curved and exserted style, a key generic feature. The fruit is a dry, pendent capsule releasing extremely numerous dust-like seeds.

Like other members of the Pyroloideae the plant is partially mycoheterotrophic, supplementing photosynthesis through mycorrhizal fungi that link it to surrounding trees, an adaptation suited to deeply shaded forest floors. The dust seeds depend on appropriate fungal partners for germination. The transfer of the old Pyrolaceae into Ericaceae reflects molecular evidence of their nesting within that family. Widespread across the Northern Hemisphere, the species is not threatened, though its Himalayan populations occupy the southern margin of a primarily boreal distribution and are of phytogeographic interest.

Author: n.n. · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China Vol. 14, Flora of Bhutan Vol. 2, Flora of North America Vol. 8, Haber: Systematics of the Pyroloideae

Fagaceae

Quercus floribunda

by G & P Jürgens

Lindl. ex A.Camus

Garh 07 97 ergebnis
India Garhwal Trijugi Narayan 2250m, June
Garh 07 98 ergebnis
India Garhwal Trijugi Narayan 2250m, June

Description

Quercus floribunda Lindl. ex A.Camus, the moru or green oak, is an evergreen tree of the Fagaceae forming a major element of the temperate forests of the western and central Himalaya. GBIF records, totalling 278 occurrences, span India, Nepal, China, Pakistan and Afghanistan, with peripheral reports. The species dominates moist, cool-temperate slopes typically between 2,000 and 2,700 m, often in association with Quercus leucotrichophora, Rhododendron arboreum and Lyonia. The photographed tree from Trijugi Narayan in Garhwal at 2,250 m, in June, is representative of these mid-altitude oak forests that are climatically and hydrologically critical to the Himalayan watershed.

The plant is a large evergreen tree reaching 25–30 m, with a rounded crown and greyish, fissured bark. The leaves are coriaceous, oblong-lanceolate to elliptic, glossy dark green above and glaucous-pubescent or glabrescent beneath, the margins entire to spinulose-serrate especially on young foliage. The species is monoecious: the staminate flowers are borne in slender pendulous catkins, while the pistillate flowers are few and inconspicuous. As the name suggests, flowering is profuse. The fruit is an ovoid acorn seated in a shallow, scaly cupule, maturing in the second year.

Quercus floribunda has long been confused with Q. dilatata and other Himalayan oaks, and its nomenclature reflects a tangled taxonomic history within the ring-cupped oak group (subgenus Cerris / section Ilex). Ecologically these oak forests are keystone communities, regulating spring discharge and supporting rich epiphyte and lichen assemblages, yet they are heavily exploited for fuelwood, fodder and leaf-litter, making mature stands increasingly fragmented and locally threatened.

Author: Lindl. ex A.Camus · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China Vol. 4, Flora of Pakistan (Fagaceae), Flora of British India Vol. 5, Menitsky: Oaks of Asia

Fagaceae

Quercus leucotrichophora

by G & P Jürgens

A.Camus

Garh 07 580 ergebnis
India Garhwal Seena 3350m, June

Description

Quercus leucotrichophora, commonly known as banj oak, is a dominant broadleaved tree of the western and central Himalaya, distributed from northern Pakistan through India (Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand) to Nepal, Bhutan, and adjacent parts of Myanmar. It forms extensive forests on north-facing slopes and mesic sites at elevations of 1,500–3,500 m, constituting one of the most ecologically important tree species in the Himalayan mid-montane zone. The species has been documented at Seena in the Garhwal Himalaya of Uttarakhand at 3,350 m in June, representing the upper elevational margin of its range where it transitions into subalpine communities.
Quercus leucotrichophora is an evergreen tree, typically 15–25 m tall, with a stout trunk and spreading, dense crown. The bark is dark grey to blackish, deeply furrowed on mature trees. Leaves are elliptic to lanceolate, 6–15 cm long and 2–5 cm wide, with a sharply serrate margin bearing spine-tipped teeth, coriaceous in texture, dark green and glabrous above, and distinctly white-tomentose beneath — the specific epithet referring to these white (leuco-) hairs (tricho-) on the leaf (phora). Flowers are unisexual and monoecious; male catkins are pendulous, 5–10 cm long, while female flowers are borne in short, erect spikes. The acorn is ovoid, 1–1.5 cm long, seated in a shallow, scaly cupule with appressed, imbricate scales.
Quercus leucotrichophora belongs to the subgenus Cerris, section Ilex, a group of evergreen oaks centred in East and South Asia. It is a keystone species in western Himalayan forests, supporting a rich community of epiphytes, mycorrhizal fungi, and avifauna. The leaf litter is a critical source of organic matter and nutrient cycling in montane soils. Banj oak forests are widely exploited for fuelwood and fodder — the leaves being an essential winter fodder resource for livestock — and ongoing lopping pressure has led to degradation of many stands, prompting conservation and restoration efforts across Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh.

Author: A.Camus · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China Vol. 4, Singh & Rawat: Flora of the Great Himalayan National Park (2000), Troup: Silviculture of Indian Trees Vol. 3

Fagaceae

Quercus semecarpifolia

by GP Jürgens

Sm.

Bhutan2014 857
Bhutan Chele-La 3000m, May
Bhutan2014 1039
Bhutan Chele-La 3000m, May
Nepal 99 374 ergebnis
West-Nepal Linji-Khola 3300m, June

Description

Quercus semecarpifolia, the kharsu oak, is an evergreen oak forming the highest-altitude oak forests of the Himalaya, native across China, Nepal, India, Bhutan, Pakistan and Afghanistan and extending into Myanmar and Thailand. It dominates upper montane and subalpine slopes, often at the treeline, generally between about 2400 and 3800 m, on cool, moist exposures. The trees photographed at Chele-La in Bhutan at 3000 m in May and along the Linji-Khola in West Nepal at 3300 m in June illustrate its role as the uppermost broad-leaved forest belt, frequently mixed with rhododendron, fir and birch near the limit of arborescent growth.

It is a large evergreen tree, gnarled and spreading at high elevations, with thick, fissured bark. The leaves are leathery and elliptic to oblong, dark glossy green above and golden- to rusty-tomentose beneath when young, the margin entire or with a few spiny teeth, especially on younger and coppice growth. It is monoecious, the male flowers in slender pendulous catkins and the female flowers solitary or few. The fruit is a large, hemispherical acorn seated in a shallow cup of appressed scales, maturing over a second season and providing important mast.

Quercus semecarpifolia belongs to subgenus Cerris (section Ilex, the ring-cupped oaks), the predominant oak lineage of the Sino-Himalayan mountains. As a treeline keystone it stabilises soils, supports rich epiphyte and understorey communities and yields hard timber, fuelwood and fodder, which makes it heavily exploited and in places poorly regenerating. Its acorns are dispersed by birds and rodents, and the species is regarded as ecologically critical yet locally threatened by overcutting and grazing across the Himalaya.

Author: Sm. · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China, Annotated Checklist of the Flowering Plants of Nepal, Flora of Bhutan, Menitsky's Oaks of Asia

Ranunculaceae

Ranunculus brotherusii

by GP Jürgens

Freyn

Sikkim2011 55
Sikkim Vista-valley 3800m, June
Sikkim2003 300 P429
Sikkim Saniti-Lake 4300m August

Description

Ranunculus brotherusii is a widespread alpine buttercup of Central Asia and the Himalaya, recorded from China, Nepal, India, Bhutan, Pakistan, Mongolia, Russia and Kyrgyzstan, with additional collections in European herbaria. Its roughly 1756 georeferenced records reflect a common and broadly distributed high-mountain species. It grows in damp alpine meadows, marshy ground, streamsides and snow-flush hollows, typically at about 3000-5000 m. The Sikkim gatherings cited above, from the Vista valley at 3800 m in June and from Saniti Lake at 4300 m in August, are characteristic, the species flowering through the short alpine summer on moist, well-watered turf.

It is a small, tufted perennial herb arising from a fibrous root system, the stems erect to ascending and sparsely appressed-hairy. The basal leaves are long-petiolate with reniform to orbicular blades that are three-lobed or further divided into crenate segments, while the cauline leaves are smaller and more deeply cut, becoming sessile above. The flowers are solitary or few, with five greenish, often pubescent sepals and five glossy yellow obovate petals each bearing a small nectary scale. The numerous stamens surround a globose to ovoid head of carpels, the fruit an aggregate of small glabrous achenes with a short curved or hooked beak.

Ranunculus is a large, cosmopolitan genus particularly diverse in cold temperate and alpine regions, and R. brotherusii belongs to its assemblage of small-flowered Asian alpine buttercups. Like its relatives it contains acrid protoanemonin compounds rendering it unpalatable and toxic to livestock, which favours its persistence on grazed pasture. Pollination is by generalist alpine flies and bees. Its extensive transboundary range and ecological tolerance place it well outside any conservation concern.

Author: Freyn · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China, Flora of Pakistan, Ranunculus of Central Asia monograph

Ranunculaceae

Ranunculus diffusus

by GP Jürgens

DC.

Nepal 97 611 P1182
Nepal Godawari 1350m May
Garh 07 47 ergebnis
India Garhwal Mandakini 2360m, June

Description

Ranunculus diffusus is a widely distributed buttercup of the Himalaya and montane Asia, recorded from India, Nepal, China, Pakistan, Bhutan, Myanmar, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and Taiwan, with some 618 occurrences in GBIF. It favours moist, shaded habitats such as forest floors, streamsides, damp banks and the margins of cultivation, ranging widely from the subtropical foothills into the temperate zone, roughly between 1000 and 3000 m. The photographs from Godawari in Nepal at about 1350 m in May and from the Mandakini valley in Garhwal at about 2360 m in June illustrate its broad ecological and altitudinal tolerance across the spring and early-monsoon flowering period.

The plant is a perennial herb with slender, diffusely spreading and often decumbent or rooting stems, the habit that gives the species its name. The basal and lower leaves are long-petioled and ternately divided into three lobed and toothed segments, more or less hairy. The flowers are small, solitary or few on slender pedicels, with usually five spreading, reflexed sepals and five glossy yellow petals each bearing a nectary scale at the base, surrounding numerous stamens and carpels. The fruiting head is a globose to ovoid cluster of small, compressed achenes tipped by a short curved or hooked beak.

Within the cosmopolitan genus Ranunculus, R. diffusus is a member of the diverse Asian assemblage of small-flowered, woodland and streamside buttercups and shows considerable variation in leaf division and pubescence across its wide range. Like most buttercups it contains the acrid glycoside ranunculin, rendering it unpalatable and somewhat toxic to livestock. Common and ecologically plastic, it is not of conservation concern and frequently behaves as a weed of moist disturbed ground.

Author: DC. · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China, Flora of Bhutan, Annotated Checklist of the Flowering Plants of Nepal, Tamura's treatment of Ranunculaceae

Ranunculaceae

Ranunculus hirtellus

by G & P Jürgens

Royle

Garh 07 105 ergebnis 1
India Garhwal Meggu Kichatti 3100m, June

Description

Ranunculus hirtellus is a widespread buttercup of the Himalaya and adjacent high mountains of Central Asia, recorded across India, Nepal, Pakistan, Afghanistan, China and Bhutan, its more than 770 georeferenced collections also reflecting extralimital and cultivated records in Iran, Japan, Korea and North America. It occupies alpine and subalpine meadows, open turf, moist grassy slopes and the margins of seasonal flushes, typically between about 2500 and 4500 m. The plant photographed at Meggu Kichatti in Garhwal at 3100 m in June shows its characteristic habitat in damp, herb-rich pasture during the early monsoon, when snowmelt keeps the soil moist.

It is a small perennial herb forming tufts from a short rootstock bearing fascicled, fibrous roots. The basal leaves are long-petioled, the blade orbicular to reniform and palmately three- to five-lobed or divided, the segments cuneate and again toothed or lobed, often hirsute with spreading hairs. Cauline leaves are smaller, sessile and more deeply dissected into narrow lobes. The flowering stems are erect to ascending and bear one to few solitary flowers; the five glossy golden-yellow petals each enclose a nectary scale and surround numerous stamens and free carpels. The fruit is an aggregate of glabrous to minutely pubescent achenes with a short, often curved beak.

Within the large and taxonomically complex genus Ranunculus, R. hirtellus belongs to a Himalayan assemblage of yellow-flowered alpine species distinguished by leaf dissection and achene characters, and it has frequently been confused with R. pulchellus and allies. Its broad altitudinal and geographic range, coupled with abundant occurrence data, indicates a secure conservation status. Like many high-elevation buttercups it contains acrid protoanemonin compounds that deter grazing, and it functions ecologically as an early-season nectar source for montane pollinators.

Author: Royle · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of Pakistan, Flora of China, Annotated Checklist of the Flowering Plants of Nepal, Tamura's monograph of Ranunculaceae