AMUSING WORLD: plants

Showing posts with label plants. Show all posts

Most Expensive Flowers in the World

Juliet rose.

This flower's cost is 30 cores is it ! ya this is true. the rose is to be released at the flowers exhibition to the public some time ago . some times known as 30 cores in a auction. David Austin who is creator of this flower in his garden after over 15 years of intensive breeding and named Juliet rose.

Gold of Kinabalu orchid

The extremely rare flower's cost is nearly 4 lacs and it takes time up to 15 years   to flower, just one stem at a time. The endangered flower can be found in Kinabalu islands of Malaysia and it blooms only between April and May.It is also called the Gold of Kinabalu

Kadupul Flower

The flower is rare and so frill that only blooms in few hours , blossoming just before midnight and perishing during the sun rise.The flower native to the mountain areas of Srilanka. The flower emits strange fragrance.No one has yet been able to remove the flower from its stem. It is completely priceless.

Saffron Crocus

Saffron crocus which is the most expensive spice in the world, can use as medicine and yellow dye. It is the dried stigma ( which is also called thread) of the crocus flower. It was first cultivated in Greece.
The Indian Saffron which is Kashmir Mogra is the world's finest saffron.
Nearly 75,000 blossoms are needed to make a single pound of saffron. for this reason, the price of saffron may range

Shenzhen Nongke Orchid

By the result of eight years research in agriculture is Shenzhen Nongke Orchid flower, It blossoms once in 5 years. The flower was sold at auction nearly 1core 25 lac's in 2005

Parrot flower

The flower petals shape resembles a parrot in flight and are in shades of pale lilac,reddish purple,and white .It is found in northern Thailand (near Chiang Mai) Myanmar and in the north-east Indian state of Manipur.

Images from; fine6.com

Parrot flower,Impatiens psittacina or parrot balsam was discovered by a British official A.H . Hildebrand, in the shan states of upper Burma

re shades of pale lilac, reddish purple, and white
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/parrotflower.asp#3TZlX04sdomYCD55.99,are

re shades of pale lilac, reddish purple, and white
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/photos/natural/parrotflower.asp#3TZlX04sdomYCD55.99

Kapok Tree

Ceiba pentandra or the Silk Cotton tree is tree belonging to tropical areas. It can reach a height of about 150 feet or even more.

1. It is a tree considered sacred by indigenous people of America.

2. It is one of the tallest trees in a rainforest vegetation.

3. The diameter of the trunk of the tree can measure upto 9 feet.

4. In many places the straight trunks of the kapok tree are used to make dugout canoes.

5. According to Taino myth, the tree would talk to the woodsmen and tell them if it was all right to cut it down. The tree spirit would also specify how it would like to be carved and painted. Those who were involved in chopping down these trees would then have a life-long responsibility to care for the transformed spirits and to make offerings to them.

Kapok tree-pod

6. A huge kapok tree, approximately 300-year-old, on the island of Antigua, has a large hollow area at the base of its trunk that can hold around 20 people at a time. It has become a spot of tourist attraction.

7. The kapok tree is deciduous, shedding all of its leaves during the dry season.

8. The white and pink flowers of the kapok tree emit a foul odor that attracts bats.

9. On the dark side, a Mayan legend warns of the evil Xtabay woman who hides in the buttresses at night and emerges to seduce and kill young men who are bewitched by her beauty.

10. The young kapok trees cannot be climbed by monkeys as they develop conical spines about an inch long.

11. The seeds, leaves, bark and resin have been used to treat dysentery, fever, asthma, and kidney disease.

12. Kapok oil has some potential as a biofuel and in paint preparation.

13. According to the folklore of Trinidad and Tobago, the Castle of the Devil is a huge kapok growing deep in the forest in which Bazil the demon of death was imprisoned by a carpenter. The carpenter tricked the devil into entering the tree in which he carved seven rooms, one above the other, into the trunk. Folklore claims that Bazil still resides in that tree.

The Wild Blue Lupine Flower

Source: Photo by USFWS; Joel Trick

The Wild Blue Lupine flower belongs to the family of legumes. It is a is a perennial flower found much in the eastern United States.It is a popular ornamental plant in gardens. Regarding the color of the flowers, they are typically blue, but can also be white, shades of purple, violet. Occasionally they can be pink. They have 5 petals.The small (1-2½'' tall) bell-shaped flowers grow on a spike. The flower stalks are about 5 inches long. They have long, slender green leaves arranged in a whorl. The palmately compound leaves have 7-11 leaflets. The stems are light to reddish green and canescent-hairy.The plant can grow up to 2 feet tall.The seed pods are elongated and up to 2 inches long. Each pod contains on an average 15 seeds. As the pods dry, they twist and eventually pop open, shooting seeds in all directions. If you are in a patch of wild blue lupine when the seeds are drying you can hear the pods exploding. They will sometimes pop open in your hands if you are collecting the seeds.

The plant was once thought to deplete or wolf the mineral content of the soil; hence the genus name derived from the Latin lupus (wolf). Quite contrarily, the plant and the family Fabaceae enhances soil fertility by fixing atmospheric nitrogen.

Blue lupine is the lone host plant for a little butterfly called the Karner Blue, an endangered species. The leaves of the wild lupine are its sole food. Habitat loss has led to the decline in plants, and put the Karner Blue on the endangered species list.When these larvae emerge in the spring they eat lupine leaves. The butterfly disappeared from Ohio when the lupines numbers start depleting.

All parts of the wild lupine flower are poisonous to humans, pets, horses and other livestock.

The best place to see wild blue lupine flowers is at Kitty Todd Preserve. The annual Blue Weekend at Kitty Todd is a celebration of blue lupine and the Karner Blue Butterfly.

Roses, Roses!

Recently, I was to Mandu in Madhya Pradesh, India. A historic place famous for the great muslim Kings who ruled here. There's the tomb of Hoshang Shah, completed in about A.D. 1440. Around the tomb is a beautiful garden with so many kinds of roses. I happened to capture a few in my camera. Here are those.

Yellow-white mix, its so gud.

Ah! this red-yellow blend shade is superb!

This is one really awesome variety.

Pinky, pinky.

Beautiful white!

Few more whites.

The bud itself is this big, what to say of the fully blossomed flower!

I think I'm not wrong if I say that there is no human being on earth who doesn't adore roses.

Plants And Their Queer Common Names

A pod of Capsella
Photo Courtesy: www.uvm.edu

Parthenium
Photo source: Wikimedia Commons

1. A shepherd's-purse: Capsella bursa-pastoris is called so because of its triangular pods that give them a purse-like appearance.

2. Political parties in plants too! Parthenium hysterophorus is better known as 'Congress Grass' due to the Congress government which imported wheat.It was a weed that came accidently along with the wheat. In India, it is more popularly known as Gajar Ghans (Carrot Grass).

Sansevieria trifasciata
Source: wikipedia

The Flame of the Forest. Clicked
this photo in
Mandu, Madhya Pradesh, India

3. Sansevieria trifasciata. Many of you know that its also called the snake plant. Now you know the reason behind it. Yeah, the shape of its leaves give it that name. Another variant is "mother-in-law's tongue" because of their sharpness. In Japan, it is called tiger's tail.

4. Next is the Flame of the Forest. Butea monosperma has got this name as it is said that the tree is a form of Agnidev, God of Fire. Another reason behind this name is its colour.

Gypsophila paniculata
Source: www.bbc.co.uk

5. Gypsophila paniculata is commonly called baby's breath. it has got branches loaded with bunches of white flowers.

Some Plants And Their Peculiar Uses

1. Boabab tree (Adamsonia) has such a large trunk that in the 1890s, one such hollow tree in Derby, Australia, was used as a prison for convicts! People in west Sudan use the hollow in its trunk to save water in the rainy season. 22 metres high Sunland baobab in Limpopo, South Africa is called "The Big Baobab Pub" as the peple there have built a pub inside its hollow trunk.

2. The sap of Acokanthera and the milky juice of Pachypodium are used as venom for arrow tips including those used for poaching elephants by traditional bushmen.

A branch of Acokenthera oppositifolia

Abrus precatorius

3. Abrus precatorius's seeds were used earlier in India to weigh gold. they used a unit called "ratti'. 8 rattis make 1 masha, 12 of which make 1 tola. 1 tola has varying measurements differing from 10-12 grams. The seeds are also a part of jewellery in Trinidad. they use them in bracelets, waist bands, anklets to mention a few mainly to ward off jumbies or evil spirits and "mal-yeux" - the evil eye.

4. People in Nigeria link Sansevieria trifasciata, the snake plant with Ogoun, the Orisha of war, in rituals to remove the evil eye.

The Spectacular Paper Flowers

Hey everyone! this is another collection of Bougainvillea flowers from my garden. We' re soon going to leave this place where we're presently staying. so, just thought of grabbing everything beautiful around me into my camera.

Bougainvillea Flowers' Beauty

Pink, red, yellow.. I have them all in my backyard. Yeah, these Bougainvillea plants are full-fledged with flowers and are a beauty to behold. I couldn't stop myself from taking pictures continuously for over half-an-hour. To adore their beauty is a nice past-time in the evenings indeed.

The red variety