I Speak For The Trees

Sorry, folks, I’m going to write off August as a lost cause.  I’ve been spending a lot of time in the forest lately, and understandably that is time I haven’t spent writing about plants.  To make it up for you, here’s a whole specialty month, in honour of the time I have been spending, speaking for some really really old trees in the primary transitional forests of Pastaza.

I have chosen September to be Aroid Month, to coincide with the international Aroid conference that will be held by the International Aroid Society, in Miami later this month.  Find out more about this and all of the other wonderful stuff done by the IAS, at http://www.aroid.org  If you’re really enthusiastic about Aroids, become a member today!  There are a host of benefits.  Equally, if you are interested in Aroid discussion, become a member of their mailing list, Aroid-L.

The transitional forests of the province of Pastaza, one of Ecuador’s Amazon basin provinces, are located on the eastern slopes of the Andes and their foothills; the forests I’ve been in over the past month are the toes of the Cordillera de los Llanganates, and are among the richest in the genus Araceae in the entire country.  These forests are between approximately 1200 and 1500 meters of elevation, with average temperatures around 18-25 degrees centigrade.  This isn’t exactly cloud forest, but it isn’t jungle either, hence the term “transitional.”  Here, then, are some of the Aroids of Pastaza; these photos come from primary forests above the town of Mera, and in one case from the highway between Shell and Puyo, Pastaza’s capital.  The photo above shows Volcan Sangay, which overlooks the transitional forests of Pastaza; it is one of Ecuador’s most active volcanoes, and is largely responsible for the generation of the area’s strong thunderstorms.  Throughout this month I will refer to “Upper” “Middle” and “Lower” transitional forest; I am referring to altitude.  I consider 1200 meters and thereabouts to be the “lower” forest, about 1300-1400 meters to be the “middle” forest, and 1500 meters and up to be the “upper” forest.  In this zone, above 1600 meters is true cloud forest, and below 1100 is true jungle.

As always, I do not pretend to be an expert on these plants; I’m sure you my faithful readers know better than I and I hope that you drop me a comment and let me know what they’re called if you do recognise them.  For the most part, these aroids will be labeled by genus and NOID; the few Anthuriums where I can definitively pin down a section will be labeled by genus and section.