Thursday, June 19, 2008

Rhododendron: Gurans in Nepali

I have three posts on general information on Rhododendron. If you are interested on scientific nomenclature, here is it.
Kingdom: Plantae
Division: Magnoliophyta
Class: Magnoliopsida
Order: Ericales
Family: Ericaceae
Genus: Rhododendron L.
Species: (depends, e.g., arboreum)
Local name: Lali gurans in case of the national flower of Nepal which looks similar to the first picture in structure but has the colour like to the second picture.
I came to know that Rhododendron is being protected and conserved through local initiatives. Click here to see the activities of that project and to know the names of different Rhododendron flowers with the help of picture.

Rhododendron from Norway

Rhododendron is widely distributed species (growing from Northern to Southern hemisphere) though higher diversity is found in Himalaya. The flower is also cultivated as ornamental due to evergreen nature of plant and different shapes, size and coloured flowers. These are the snaps of some of the ornamental Rhododendrons in Norway.


Rhododendron - Nepal's national flower

Rhododendron is a beautiful flower with different colours and shapes. The Greek translation of Rhododendron means 'Rose tree'. However, Rhododendron may be small shrub to tall tree (up to 12 m). The hills of Nepal are coloured red, white or pink during the blooming season of Rhododendron. This flower also got national recognizing as national flower in Nepal. The genus and species which is dark red in colour is Rhododendron arboreum which is called as 'Lali Gurans' in Nepali. I will be posting the pictures of different Rhododendrons from Norway. Sorry, I don't know their species name.