GS 3: Environment &BD

Why in news?

• Lecanorchis Taiwaniana (the parasitic bloom), a type of Orchid was accidentally discovered in Assam by Assam’s forest officer named Jatindra Sarma.
• He is also the Member Secretary of State Medicinal Plants Board.

Lecanorchis Taiwaniana:

• The orchid species is already known in Japan, Taiwan and Laos.
• This is the first time it is discovered in India.
• Its discovery was published in the Japanese Journal of Botany with the title as “New record for the flora in India”.
• Lecanorchis Taiwaniana is a mycoheterotroph, which means it is one of the two known types of parasitic plants which have abandoned photosynthesis and derives nutrients and its energy from fungus.It is a variant of a Japanese orchid.
• It is India’s one ofsmallest botanically recorded Orchids in terms of size and duration of bloom.
• The discovery of Lecanorchis Taiwaniana adds to the Orchid wealth of North East India (NEI).
• India has about 1,300 species of orchids out of which 800 are found in NEI, about 300 species are found in the Western Ghats and 200 in North Western Himalayas.