For the underwater-dwelling tape grass Enhalus acoroides, pollination is an adventure where female flowers have their work cut out. The pinkish-green male flowers produce plenty of pollen, encased in long…
The shade of a tree gives a much-needed respite from the sweltering heat. While checking messages on the phone, you see a movement out of the corner of your eye.…
In the year 2014, when Jammu and Kashmir was facing one of its worst floods, a group of researchers from the National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources (NBPGR) and Punjab…
A school teacher in Meghalaya spent the last four days of his holidays travelling around 30 villages looking at trees. Resly Roy Pariong was scanning trees in backyards, gardens and…
On a gloomy afternoon in May 2018, conservation biologist Bibhab Talukdar was visiting Pobitora National Park in Assam. As he rode an elephant into the grasslands at the core of…
For close to 20 years after a supercyclone ravaged Odisha, a group of women along the coast has been standing sentinel over their beloved storm-shielding forest and mangrove cover. Deftly…
Siam weed (Chromolaena odorata), a commonly seen plant in Kerala, is locally known as “Communist Pacha (green)”, as it spread all over the state within a short span of time just like Communism…
Seventy women from three villages in Assam mobilised and sensitised over 10,000 people for protecting the endangered greater adjutant stork and its supporting habitat in their villages. Their efforts highlight…
The year 2019 is here, and with it there is a general feeling of excitement, which we all feel when something is "new". Before the feeling gets old, let's take…
Very few tropical forests around the world enjoy uninterrupted contiguity. Most are divided into uneven, small fragments, cut off from each other, their boundaries marked by roads or farms. But as…
In eastern Himalayas’ Khangchendzonga National Park (KNP), eye-catching Wight's rhododendron shrubs and graceful firs, frame the upper limits of the sub-alpine forests. Beyond this boundary of closed canopy forests, called…
India which has “great expertise” in conservation of genetic resources of crop plants through seed banking is now “rapidly” working to extend the safeguards to difficult-to-conserve (recalcitrant) seeds of wild…
The fall armyworm, an exotic pest from the Americas, has been reported from India for the first time. Scientists are concerned that the pest could pose a serious threat to…
The 2004 Sumatra-Andaman earthquake followed by the catastrophic tsunami gobbled up landmass and stripped the coast of trees in the Nicobar Islands in the Indian Ocean. Mangroves, which flourish where…
The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) celebrated 25 years of coming into force this year. "Celebrating 25 years of action for biodiversity" was the theme for the International Day of…
“There is no national science, just as there is no national multiplication table; what is national is no longer science.” - Anton Chekhov A leading taxonomist from one of India’s…
Starting late July, the Anamalai hills near Munnar in Kerala will be resplendent, clad in a purplish blue carpet. The famed neelakurinji (Strobilanthes kunthiana) will burst into flower – a…
Stashed away in earthquake proof and environment-controlled vaults in south India, are thousands of stockpiles of seeds of crops important to semi-arid tropics covering Asia, much of southern and eastern…
Amid concerns of rising carbon dioxide levels sapping nutrients from crops, “Parbhani Shakti”, India's first biofortified sorghum variety with enhanced zinc and iron, offers hope in tackling undernutrition and preserving…
A skeleton of a common minke whale that was found stranded along the Myanmar coast in 1804 to a century-old quinine tablet-producing machine— fascinating exhibits are on display at Asia’s oldest museum,…
