More Cyps from China

[KyushuCalanthe]

Here's the last video on wild Cyps from the botanical tour I went on in June. Lots of species in there, plus some info on their habitats. Enjoy.

Assorted Cyps from Sichuan

 

[monocotman]

Tom - great video as always,
David

 

[abax]

The plants are so lovely and the atmosphere perfect...a little wet maybe.
I enjoyed the video very much. Thank you.

 

[MaryPientka]

Truly fascinating. Thank you!

 

[eaborne]

Wonderful!

 

[SlipperFan]

You do such good work, Tom! I hope your website gets lots of traffic.

 

[Amadeus]

FANTASTIC! Thank you.

 

[KyushuCalanthe]

Glad you all enjoyed it. I still have quite a bit of video that needs assembling, but not enough time to get it done! So, keep your eyes peeled this spring...

Angela, yup, really wet many days. The worst day there was a torrential downpour at times, I lost my digital recorder (later found by a tour member), and it was nearly impossible to keep lenses dry. I remember vividly hanging off the edge of a scree field trying to photograph a Cyp. farreri in a full downpour, and NOT fall down the hill (about 150 above the bottom of the canyon). Exciting stuff.

Dot, the site is doing OK. To get better visitation the key is more content, though the reality is that most folks will never see these vids because there is no interest or knowledge of such topics. So you are driven to write about and make videos of things people know about - a tricky thing to balance without making the content trivial.

 

[Rick]

Really cool Tom

Are some of the bushes Rhodos or Laurels?

There's things that remind me of the Southern Smokey's in these videos.

 

[KyushuCalanthe]

Hey Rick, lots of rhodos in this part of the world, dizzying numbers of them, and lots of ericaceous plants in general. I've heard that even the experts can be overwhelmed with the diversity in this region. I couldn't even begin to touch on the subject of woody plants in China. Here's a good place to start:

Asian Flora

The lower elevations do remind you of some areas in the southern Appalachians, though they are much more dramatic in form - perhaps the high Smokies come close. Anything above 3000 meters is another world, physically looking more like alpine areas in the Rockies until you come against a 6,000 meter giant and you've graduated into the Himalayas!

The plant diversity in this region is insane due to all this variation. The Sichuan Plain is subtropical and essentially frost free, while a mere 60 km into the "hills" and there are mountains with alpine tundra. A little further west you hit the Tibetian Plateau and then you're in the real deal - the largest alpine tundra region in the world, smack in the middle of the subtropics.