Recently, in Maolan national nature reserve, a primitive habitants of aspidistra was discovered while the scientific researchers investigating resource of Wild Fauna and Flora. Its discovery will provide reliable scientific basis for the research on foliage of Karst region. Nia has the report.

    The primitive habitant of aspidistra was discovered in a forest of Maolan National Nature Reserve having an area of 0.5 square kilometers. With a large area of habitant, this kind of aspidistra is dense and has the outstanding ecological character.

    Aspidistra belongs to lily family and has large evergreen basal leaves and small, brownish bell-shaped flowers. It has large and dark green leaves which are 22 cm to 45 cm in length and 7 cm to 11 cm in width and are speckled and highlighted with yellow-to white dots. The leaves held on the short stalk, the base of rootstalk is spider-web-liked and is little bit out of the ground. Aspidistra can be used as medical material as well as cultivated as houseplant having highly value for appreciation.

    According to experts, aspidistra is a kind of plant picky to its living environment. It can only grow in temperate environment and requires certain humidity, soil and sunray. In other areas of Maolan national nature reserve, there are even some scattered, but totaled only 3-5 individuals. However, the discovery of this large primitive habitant of aspidistra which has thousands of individual is the first time in scientific investigation of wild plants resource in Maolan and is very important for further scientific research.  

 Meishan Zhou (Nia)