Rhododendrons from Nilgiri's south India

[Kiran Srivastava]

From: Kiran Srivastava [mailto:kir...@vsnl.net]
Sent: 19 February 2008 08:52
To: 'WildFlo...@yahoogroups.com'
Cc: 'Rishad Naoroji'
Subject: Rhododendrons from Nilgiri's south India

 

Here is a Rhododendron from Munnar, Nilgiri’s taken by Rishad Naoroji.

 

Cheers,

Kiran Srivastava

Mumbai

kir...@vsnl.net

 

[J.M. Garg]

Lovely flowers fro Nilgiris.

Rhododendron (from the Greek: rhodos, "rose", and dendron, "tree") is a genus of flowering plants in the family Ericaceae. It is a large genus with over 1000 species and most have showy flower displays. It includes the plants known to gardeners as azaleas.

The Rhododendron is a genus characterized by shrubs and small to (rarely) large trees, the smallest species growing to 10-20 cm tall, and the largest, R. arboreum, reported to 50 m tall. The leaves are spirally arranged; leaf size can range from 1-2 cm to over 50 cm, exceptionally 100 cm in R. sinogrande. They may be either evergreen or deciduous. In some species the underside of the leaves are covered with scales (lepidote) or hairs (indumentum). Some of the best known species are noted for their many clusters of large flowers. There are alpine species with small flowers and small leaves, and tropical species such as subgenus Vireya that often grow as epiphytes.

The above inf. taken from Wikipedia link:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhododendron

 

For my Birds, Butterflies, Trees, Lanscape pictures etc., visit  http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:Contributions/J.M.Garg