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Summer

Caryophyllaceae

Stellaria decumbens var. pulvinata

by G & P Jürgens

Edgew. & Hook. f.

Nepal 99 555 ergebnis
West-Nepal Churta-Khola 4100m, June
Nepal 99 799 ergebnis
West-Nepal Baga-La-Phedi 4500m, July

Description

Stellaria decumbens var. pulvinata is a diminutive alpine chickweed of the Himalaya and adjoining Tibetan plateau, recorded by GBIF from China, India, Nepal and Bhutan with around 104 occurrences. The variety occupies cold, exposed alpine and subnival terrain, where it grows in rock crevices, on stabilised scree and among cushion vegetation at very high elevations. It was photographed in West Nepal in the Churta-Khola at 4100 m in June and near the Baga-La-Phedi at 4500 m in July, habitats typical of its preference for open, gravelly ground close to the upper limit of vascular plant life.

As its epithet pulvinata implies, this variety forms dense, hard, compact cushions, more condensed than the laxer typical S. decumbens. The slender, much-branched stems are crowded and decumbent, bearing small, sessile, narrowly lanceolate to ovate leaves arranged in opposite pairs, often somewhat fleshy and ciliate at the margins. The minute flowers are solitary or few, with five free, lanceolate, acuminate sepals and five white petals that are deeply bifid for roughly half their length, the characteristic forked petals of Stellaria; stamens are typically ten and the styles three. The fruit is a small ovoid capsule dehiscing by six valves and releasing several reniform, finely tuberculate seeds.

GBIF accepts the variety. The cushion habit represents convergent adaptation to wind desiccation, frost and a short season shared by many unrelated high-Himalayan plants. Within Caryophyllaceae the species belongs to a complex of dwarf alpine Stellaria whose infraspecific limits remain debated. No conservation concern attaches to this widespread, naturally cryptic high-altitude taxon.

Author: Edgew. & Hook. f. · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of Nepal, Flora of China, monograph of Himalayan Caryophyllaceae

Caryophyllaceae

Stellaria semivestita

by G & P Jürgens

Edgew.

Nepal 2009 68 ergebnis
Nepal Helambu Yangri 1330, May
Garh 07 340 ergebnis
India Garhwal Dohdi-Tal 3070m, June

Description

Stellaria semivestita Edgew. is a delicate herbaceous member of the Caryophyllaceae native to the Himalaya and the mountains of southwestern China. GBIF data place it in Nepal, India and China, with a modest 22 georeferenced records reflecting its inconspicuous habit and uneven collection. The species occupies a broad altitudinal span, from warm-temperate forest understorey and shaded banks at around 1,300 m up to subalpine meadows and damp rocky slopes near 3,000 m. The cited gatherings from Helambu (Yangri, Nepal) at 1,330 m and from Dohdi-Tal in Garhwal at 3,070 m illustrate this ecological amplitude across the monsoon-influenced Himalayan front.

The plant is a weak-stemmed, ascending to straggling perennial with quadrangular stems that are pubescent at least in lines, the indumentum being uneven or "half-clothed" as the epithet implies. The leaves are opposite, sessile to shortly petiolate, ovate-lanceolate to lanceolate, acuminate and ciliate at the margins. Flowers are borne in lax, leafy dichasial cymes; the five sepals are lanceolate and the five white petals are deeply bifid, equalling or slightly exceeding the calyx. The fruit is an ovoid capsule dehiscing by six valves and containing numerous reniform, finely tuberculate seeds.

Stellaria semivestita belongs to a taxonomically complex genus in which species delimitation rests on subtle differences in pubescence, petal length and seed sculpture. It is of no conservation concern, being widespread and adaptable, but it contributes to the ground-layer diversity of Himalayan forests and clearings and exemplifies the genus's success across a wide elevational gradient.

Author: Edgew. · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China Vol. 6, Flora of Nepal, Flora of Pakistan (Caryophyllaceae), Majumdar: Caryophyllaceae of India

Thymelaeaceae

Stellera chamaejasme

by GP Jürgens

L.

Nepal 1989 65
Nepal Bhatang 2915m, April
Nepal 99 362 ergebnis
West-Nepal Kalomura 3600m, June

Description

Stellera chamaejasme is a widespread perennial herb of the dry uplands of Central and East Asia, recorded by GBIF from China, Russia, Mongolia, Nepal, India, Bhutan, Kazakhstan, Korea, Iran and Turkey, among others, across some 3,400 georeferenced occurrences. It is characteristic of arid and semi-arid grasslands, alpine and subalpine meadows, sunny rocky slopes and overgrazed pastures on the Tibetan Plateau and throughout the trans-Himalaya, generally between about 2,600 and 4,500 m. The cited Nepalese records, from Bhatang at 2,915 m in April and from Kalomura in West Nepal at 3,600 m in June, span its lower temperate and upper subalpine occurrences and bracket its long spring-to-summer flowering season. It thrives on poor, dry soils where grazing has reduced competing vegetation.

The plant grows from a thick, woody, deep-seated taproot and rootstock, producing numerous erect, slender, unbranched leafy stems in a dense tuft. The leaves are numerous, alternate, crowded, narrowly lanceolate to elliptic, sessile and entire. The flowers are borne in a dense terminal capitate head; each flower lacks petals but has a showy, petaloid, tubular calyx whose five spreading lobes are commonly white above and flushed rose-red to purplish in bud on the outside, producing a striking bicoloured head. There are typically ten stamens in two whorls within the calyx tube, and the fruit is a small dry achene-like nutlet enclosed in the persistent base of the perianth.

Stellera chamaejasme is the best-known species of its genus within Thymelaeaceae and is notorious as a toxic, unpalatable indicator of rangeland degradation; its expansion is regarded across Tibet and Mongolia as a sign of overgrazing, since livestock avoid the poisonous foliage and roots. The plant is rich in bioactive diterpenoids and lignans and has a long history in Tibetan and Chinese traditional medicine, while its tough bast fibres have been used in papermaking. Though abundant and in no way threatened, it is ecologically significant as both a grassland weed and a chemically defended species of considerable pharmacological interest.

Author: L. · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China Vol. 13, Flora of Bhutan Vol. 2, Flora of Nepal, Flora of Pakistan, Tan & Wang: revision of Asian Thymelaeaceae and the Stellera complex

Asteraceae

Stenoseris graciliflora

by GP Jürgens

(Wall. ex DC.) C.Shih

Bhutan2012 428
Bhutan Wangdi 3300m, June

Description

Stenoseris graciliflora is a slender herbaceous composite of the temperate to subalpine Himalaya, ranging through China, India, Nepal, Myanmar and Bhutan, with 160 GBIF records tracing its distribution along the moist montane forest belt and adjoining clearings. It typically grows in forest margins, shrubberies and grassy openings on humus-rich soils between roughly 2500 and 3800 m. The illustrated plant was collected near Wangdi in western Bhutan at about 3300 m in June, in the upper temperate zone where the monsoon supports a tall-herb flora amid fir and rhododendron forest.

In GBIF the name is treated as a synonym, with Stenoseris graciliflora maintained as the accepted name for this entity. The plant is an erect perennial with slender, often leafy and branching stems exuding milky latex when broken, as is typical of the lettuce tribe. The leaves are thin, the lower ones often lyrate-pinnatifid and narrowing to a winged petiole, the upper smaller and clasping. The inflorescence is a lax, narrow panicle of small, few-flowered capitula, each enclosed by a cylindrical involucre of imbricate phyllaries; the florets are all ligulate and pale blue to lilac. The fruit is a flattened, ribbed cypsela bearing a soft white pappus of fine bristles.

Stenoseris is a small genus of the tribe Cichorieae (Lactuceae), segregated from Cicerbita and Lactuca on the basis of its slender capitula, achene morphology and pappus characters. The basionym authority (Wall. ex DC.) C.Shih reflects the species' long taxonomic passage among these closely allied genera. As a widespread montane herb it is not regarded as threatened, though it serves as a useful indicator of intact, humid temperate forest understorey.

Author: (Wall. ex DC.) C.Shih · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China, Flora of Bhutan, Compositae of the Himalaya (Cichorieae monographs)

Liliaceae

Streptopus simplex

by G & P Jürgens

D.Don

CA5B74EED12643D5951B19E897481F0A
Bhutan Chogcham, 3300m June
Sikkim2003 474 P657
Sikkim Lachung Valley 3200m August

Description

Streptopus simplex, a twistedstalk of the Sino-Himalayan region, is distributed across China (CN), Nepal (NP), Bhutan (BT), India (IN), Myanmar (MM) and Japan (JP), with 726 GBIF occurrences indicating it is a frequent component of high forest. It grows in shaded, humid temperate and subalpine coniferous and broadleaf forest, in bamboo thickets, ravines and on mossy slopes, typically between about 3000 and 4000 m. The illustrated plants came from Chogcham in Bhutan at around 3300 m in June and the Lachung Valley of Sikkim at about 3200 m in August, spanning the early- and late-monsoon flowering and fruiting seasons.

It is a slender perennial herb arising from a short creeping rhizome, with an erect, simple or sparingly branched stem. The leaves are alternate, sessile and somewhat clasping, ovate to lanceolate with entire margins and parallel venation. The flowers are solitary and nodding, borne on slender pedicels that hang beneath the leaves; the perianth consists of six free, campanulate to spreading tepals, white to pink and often purple-spotted within. There are six stamens, and the ovary is superior. The fruit is a globose, fleshy red berry containing several seeds, providing dispersal by birds and other animals.

Streptopus is now placed in Liliaceae sensu lato (the family cited verbatim here), within the Lilioid monocots; some treatments segregate it variably among the lily allies. The genus has a disjunct circumboreal and montane Asian-American distribution, and S. simplex represents its Himalayan and East Asian extension, of biogeographic interest as part of the temperate forest-floor herb flora.

Author: D.Don · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China, Flora of Bhutan, Flora of Nepal, Monograph of the genus Streptopus

Acanthaceae

Strobilanthes echinata

by GP Jürgens

Nees

BhutanPG2011 806 01 01
Bhutan Chele-La, 3800m July

Description

Strobilanthes echinata Nees is a shrubby herb of the acanthus family widely distributed through tropical and subtropical Asia, with GBIF documenting 319 occurrences from India (IN), Bhutan (BT), China (CN), Myanmar (MM), Thailand (TH), Vietnam (VN), Indonesia (ID), Malaysia (MY), Laos, Cambodia and Bangladesh. It is a plant of moist forest understorey, shaded slopes, ravines and clearings ranging from the warm lowlands to high temperate elevations. It was photographed in Bhutan on the Chele-La at 3800 m in July, near the upper limit of its range, where it grows in the cool, humid forest belt. The source URL references Strobilanthes wallichii, indicating a synonymous or closely allied treatment.

The plant is a perennial herb or soft shrub with quadrangular, often anisophyllous-leaved stems. The leaves are opposite and decussate, ovate to elliptic, acuminate and toothed, with cystoliths visible as fine streaks, the paired leaves of a node frequently unequal in size as is characteristic of the genus. The flowers are borne in dense, often spiciform or capitate inflorescences subtended by conspicuous, sometimes spiny-tipped or bristly bracts, the epithet echinata alluding to this prickly aspect. The corolla is tubular and curved, five-lobed and blue to violet or pale lilac. The fruit is an elongate, two-valved, explosively dehiscent capsule bearing a few flattened seeds.

Strobilanthes is a large and taxonomically difficult Asian genus famous for its mass-flowering, plietesial life cycle in which whole populations bloom synchronously after several years and then die. Its centre of diversity lies in the Indo-Burmese and Sino-Himalayan region, making it an important element of Asian forest floras. The bird- and insect-pollinated flowers and explosively dispersed seeds aid colonisation of forest gaps. While many species are narrow endemics of conservation concern, S. echinata is comparatively widespread.

Author: Nees · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of Bhutan, Flora of China, Strobilanthes monograph (Y. F. Deng & J. R. I. Wood revision)

Gentianaceae

Swertia hookeri

by GP Jürgens

C.B. Clarke

Sikkim2003 447 P620
Sikkim Chopta Valley 3800m August
Sikkim2003 448 K620.2
Sikkim Chopta Valley 3800m August

Description

Swertia hookeri is an eastern Himalayan gentian of comparatively restricted range, recorded from India (chiefly Sikkim and Darjeeling), Nepal, Bhutan and the bordering provinces of southern China, GBIF holding around 63 occurrences consistent with a regional endemic. It inhabits moist alpine and upper subalpine zones, growing on open grassy slopes, among shrubberies, on rock ledges and along stream margins where snowmelt maintains high soil moisture. The plant photographed in August in the Chopta Valley of Sikkim at about 3800 m is typical of its elevation band, flowering at the height of the monsoon when the alpine turf is lush and humid.

It is a robust perennial or biennial herb with a stout, erect, often purple-tinged stem arising from a thick rootstock. The leaves are largely basal, broadly elliptic to ovate, conspicuously several-nerved and narrowed to a sheathing base, the cauline leaves becoming smaller and sessile upward. The inflorescence is a leafy branched panicle of large, broadly campanulate flowers; the corolla is usually 4- or 5-merous, pale greenish-yellow to whitish and densely veined with purplish-blue reticulation, each lobe bearing a pair of fimbriate nectary pits at the base. Stamens alternate with the lobes, and the superior ovary develops into a septicidal capsule with numerous small seeds.

Described by C. B. Clarke, Swertia hookeri belongs to a large, taxonomically intricate genus centred on the Sino-Himalayan region, forming part of a species swarm noted for diagnostic nectary morphology. Like many congeners it is rich in bitter secoiridoid and xanthone compounds and is gathered locally for medicinal and febrifugal use. Its dependence on intact high-altitude grassland renders it potentially sensitive to grazing pressure and climate-driven treeline shifts, though it has not been formally evaluated.

Author: C.B. Clarke · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of Bhutan, Flora of China, Hara Flora of Eastern Himalaya, Clarke revision of Swertia

Gentianaceae

Swertia multicaulis

by GP Jürgens

D. Don

Sikkim2003 301 G422
Sikkim Saniti-Lake 4250m August

Description

Swertia multicaulis is a high-alpine Himalayan gentian distributed through Nepal, China, India, Bhutan and recorded marginally from Kazakhstan, with GBIF holding around 144 occurrences along the main Himalayan chain. It is a plant of the upper alpine zone, growing on damp, peaty or gravelly meadows, moist rock ledges, seepage slopes and the margins of glacial lakes and snowbeds. The specimen from Saniti Lake in Sikkim at about 4250 m in August typifies its preference for cold, moisture-saturated high-altitude turf, where it flowers late in the short growing season as the monsoon wanes and snowmelt keeps the substrate constantly wet.

As its epithet indicates, it is a low perennial herb producing several stems from a stout, often branched rootstock crowned by a rosette of leaves. The basal leaves are obovate to spathulate, entire and narrowed to a petiolar base, forming a compact tuft, while the few stem leaves are small and sessile. The flowers are borne singly or in few-flowered clusters and are typically 4- or 5-merous; the corolla is rotate and deep blue-purple to violet, the lobes ovate-lanceolate and each furnished at the base with one or two fringed nectary scales characteristic of the genus. The stamens alternate with the corolla lobes, and the superior ovary ripens into a many-seeded capsule.

Described by D. Don, Swertia multicaulis is part of the speciose, taxonomically complex Sino-Himalayan radiation of the genus, where species are separated largely by nectary structure, corolla colour and habit. Its cushion-forming, multi-stemmed growth is an adaptation to wind-swept, frost-prone high-alpine conditions. The plant accumulates bitter secoiridoids and xanthones and, like other swertias, has a reputation in local folk medicine. Restricted to intact high-elevation wetland and meadow habitats, it may be vulnerable to grazing and to upward habitat compression under a warming climate.

Author: D. Don · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China, Flora of Bhutan, Hara Enumeration of Flowering Plants of Nepal, Clarke revision of Swertia

Gentianaceae

Swertia pseudohookeri

by GP Jürgens

Harry Sm.

BhutanPG2011 341
Bhutan Jule-Tso, 4000m June

Description

Swertia pseudohookeri is an eastern Himalayan species recorded from Bhutan, Nepal and India, represented in occurrence databases by a modest 17 georeferenced records that reflect both its restricted distribution and its limited collection. It is a plant of high-alpine habitats—moist meadows, open turf, streamsides and the damp margins of glacial lakes—generally near and above 4000 m. The illustrated population at Jule-Tso in Bhutan, photographed at 4000 m in June, typifies its occurrence around tarns and snowmelt flushes where it flowers in the brief alpine summer.

It is an erect annual or short-lived perennial herb with a slender, often quadrangular and sometimes narrowly winged stem arising from a fibrous root. The leaves are opposite, sessile and lanceolate to ovate, with the basal leaves usually larger and the upper ones progressively reduced and bract-like. The inflorescence is a lax, few- to many-flowered cyme; the flowers are typically four- to five-merous with a deeply divided rotate corolla, the lobes pale to bluish or purplish and marked with darker veining, each bearing nectary pits fringed with fimbriae. The fruit is a septicidal, ovoid capsule containing numerous small seeds.

The epithet pseudohookeri, coined by Harry Smith, signals its close morphological resemblance to Swertia hookeri, from which it is distinguished by floral and nectary characters. Swertia is a large, taxonomically intricate genus in the Gentianaceae whose Himalayan members have long been used in traditional medicine for their bitter secoiridoid compounds. Owing to its narrow range and high-elevation niche, S. pseudohookeri is potentially vulnerable to climatic shifts and habitat disturbance, though it has not been formally evaluated.

Author: Harry Sm. · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Grierson & Long Flora of Bhutan, Annotated Checklist of the Flowering Plants of Nepal, Flora of China (Gentianaceae), Harry Smith's monographic studies on Asiatic Swertia

Symplocaceae

Symplocos ramosissima

by GP Jürgens

Wall. ex G. Don

Garh 07 236 ergebnis
India Garhwal Barron Chatti 2450m, June
Garh 07 237 ergebnis
India Garhwal Barron Chatti 2450m, June

Description

Symplocos ramosissima is an evergreen shrub or small tree widely distributed through the Sino-Himalayan and Indochinese region, with GBIF recording around 1472 occurrences across China, Nepal, India, Myanmar, Bhutan, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Sri Lanka and Taiwan. It is a characteristic component of moist broad-leaved evergreen and mixed temperate forests, occurring on humid slopes, ridge forests and forest margins generally between 1500 and 3000 m. The individual photographed at Barron Chatti in Garhwal, India, at about 2450 m in June sits within this mid-montane band, where the species forms part of the dense understorey and lower-canopy layer of laurel-oak and rhododendron-rich forests on the southern Himalayan flank.

Morphologically it is a much-branched evergreen with glabrous or finely pubescent young twigs and alternate, simple, coriaceous leaves; the blades are elliptic to lanceolate, with a serrate to crenate-serrate margin and an acuminate apex. The flowers are small, white, fragrant and borne in short axillary spikes or racemes, each with a persistent calyx, a rotate to shortly campanulate corolla of five lobes and numerous stamens fused into fascicles at the base, the pollination biology favouring small generalist insects. The fruit is a small ovoid to cylindric drupe, blue-black to purplish when ripe, crowned by the persistent calyx lobes and containing a hard stone, dispersed largely by frugivorous birds.

The family Symplocaceae comprises the single large genus Symplocos, a taxonomically intricate group well represented in the Himalaya and East Asia. The genus is notable for accumulating aluminium and for the yellow dye historically obtained from the bark and leaves of several species, which were used as mordants in traditional textile dyeing. As a common and ecologically wide-ranging forest element, S. ramosissima is not considered threatened, though its dependence on intact mid-elevation evergreen forest links its local persistence to the conservation of those increasingly fragmented montane habitats.

Author: Wall. ex G. Don · Sources: POWO (Kew), GBIF, Flora of China Vol. 15, Flora of Bhutan Vol. 2, Flora of Nepal, Nooteboom Revision of Symplocaceae of the Old World