Forest, Wildlife & Environment Department Government of Gilgit-Baltistan
Common Name: Bani, Shah blaoot
Local Name: Bani
COMMON NAMES: Bhurj Patta, Birch
Local name: Jonzi, Taliyang
Trees or small shrubs, 2-15 m tall. Bark peeling horizontally, white, brownish or reddish-white. Young shoots pubescent, older glabrescent. Leaves ovate or rhomboid, 2.5-8.2 cm x 1.8-6.2 cm, base rounded, subcordate or cuneate, margin doubly serrate to sub-serrate, the surface sparsely pilose, often villous at the angles of the veins on the under surface; acute or acuminate; nerve pairs 6-9(-11). Petiole 0.9-2 cm long, pilose to pubescent. Male flowers in catkins 3-3.7 cm x c.4 mm. Bract is broadly ovate-obtuse, c. 1.7 mm long, pubescent on the inside; bracteoles more or less navicular, c. 1.2 mm long, ciliate. Filament inconspicuously forked, anthers c. the size of the bracteoles, oblong, sometimes aristate at the tip. Strobili 2.5-4 cm x c. 1.2 cm. Styles are variable in size. Fruiting scale 8-9 mm long, woody, lobes minutely ciliate; median lobe 4-5 mm long, linear-lanceolate, longer than the 2 erect or outspread laterals. Nut elliptic—ovate, 2.5-3 mm long, as broad as or broader than the wing. Wing sometimes with 1-2 linear appendages at the apex.
Mainly located all over Gilgit-Baltistan. The temperate Himalaya, from Kashmir to Bhutan and Afghanistan.
Birch is commonly found at the upper limit of trees, from 3000-4500 m, usually gregarious at places. A very polymorphic species as regards the shape and the number of veins of the leaf, size of the male catkins and the nature of the fruiting scale, which gradually change from the Western to the Eastern limit of its distribution range. I consider this to be an aggregate species. Some authors regard Betula jacquemontii Spach as a distinct species (Beans, Trees and Shrubs, Hardy in the British Isles, ed.8.1:434.1970 and Borowicz in Rech.f., Fl.lran.96.4.1972) but there is so much variation in the different parts that it merges into Betula utilis D. Don and it is hard to separate these from one another. The bark is smooth and white peels horizontally and is used for roofing, for umbrella covers and as a substitute for writing paper. The leaves are used as fodder for cattle.
Common name: Kachel, Himalayan Spruce
Local name: Kachul, Raien
Trees to 60 m tall and 200 cm dbh, with a conical crown of pendulous branchlets. Bark pale brown, breaking into irregular plates. Branchlets pale brown or pale gray, glabrous. Leaves spreading radially, directed obliquely forward, slender, curved, quadrangular in cross-section, 33-55×1.3-1.8 mm, with 2-5 stomatal lines on each surface, apex acute or acuminate. Seed cones green, maturing brown, lustrous, cylindric, 10-18 × 4.5-5 cm. Seed scales broadly obovate, thick, ca. 3 × 2.4 cm, broadly triangular-obtuse. Seeds dark brown, ca. 5 mm, with a 10-15 mm wing (Wu and Raven 1999).
Mainly located in Astore, Gilgit and Diamer Districts of Gilgit-Baltistan. Afghanistan, India: Kashmir, Nepal, Pakistan, S Tibet Wu and Raven (1999). Hardy to Zone 7 (cold hardiness limit between -17.7°C and -12.2°C) (Bannister and Neuner 2001).
Vladimir Dinets (e-mail, 2004.1.14) reports that Kalam, in Pakistan’s Swat Valley, has a large forest of Cedrus deodara with some Picea smithiana and Pinus wallichiana. He also found it growing along the trail to Nanga Parbat Base Camp. “The trailhead is accessible from Gilgit by a hired jeep, or Raikot Bridge on the Karakoram Highway by hitchhiking (early morning only). Near the trailhead are some Pinus gerardiana, Juniperus semiglobosa and Cupressus torulosa, higher up – Pinus wallichiana and Picea smithiana (slim, but up to 50 m tall).
Common name: Juniper
Local name: Chili, Gal
“Habit: tree, occasionally a shrub or a prostrate shrub, max. height 20-25 m, dbh 1.5-2.5 m or more, usually monopodial in tree forms; branches of first-order spreading or ascending, crooked in old trees: branches of higher orders more or less ascending in young trees, spreading and finally somewhat pendulous in old trees; crown (broad) pyramidal in young trees, mature trees broad, irregular, or shrub-like to prostrate in alpine locations; bark (young trees, branches) smooth, soon with papery flakes, reddish-brown, later fibrous, on old trees longitudinally furrowed, peeling in long strips, purplish-to reddish-brown. Foliage: branchlets numerous, in dorsiventral sprays (young trees) or more irregular and very dense esp. in a dry environment; ultimate branchlets covered with leaves, quadrangular to more or less terete, very fine, diam. 0.7-1 mm, persistent. Leaves: Juvenile leaves on seedlings or on lower, shaded branches of trees, ternate, acicular, c. 8-10 x l mm, widest at the base, keeled, pungent; mature leaves scale-like, decussate, imbricate, appressed or free at the mostly incurved apex, decurrent at the base, ovate-rhombic on ultimate branchlets, (ob)lanceolate-acute on older shoots (-3.5 mm long), 0.6-1.1 x 0.4-0.8 mm, with entire margins; glands large and conspicuous, elliptic to nearly circular, often resinous; stomata on juvenile leaves epistomatic, on mature leaves amphistomatic in mostly 2 inconspicuous lines tapering from base to apex; color light green or yellowish-green; in juvenile as well as in mature leaves a single median resin cavity occurs. Male strobili: numerous, solitary and terminal or subterminal on ultimate branchlets, 3-4 x 2-3 mm, greenish maturing yellowish; microsporophylls 8-10, peltate with rounded, thin margins, each bearing 3-4 pollen sacs. Female cones: numerous, mostly solitary and axillary, subterminal on ultimate branchlets, sessile; young strobili stellate-spheroid. surrounded by green leaves or bracts, 2-3 mm diam., purplish-green to blue; mature cones globose, l mm diam., purplish-brown to blackish-purple, often pruinose; seed scales 4(-6), decussate, entirely fused with bracts and each other, the two largest meeting at the distal pole of the cone, 4-9 mm long, surface smooth, waxy, with a ridge terminating in a small umbo (0.5-0.6 mm), interior resinous, becoming woody, yellowish (in sicco). Seeds: (2-)3-6(-8) per cone (some ovules usually abort), angular, broadest at the base, ovoid but flattened or curved, 4-6 x 3-4 mm, yellowish to reddish-brown.
“Juniperus excelsa subsp. polycarpous differs from the typical subspecies in the following characters: Ultimate branchlets more quadrangular, thicker (1-1.3 mm), often irregularly disposed and intricate, leaves on ultimate branchlets sometimes free at apex, larger (1.2-1.6 x 0.8-0.9 mm); female cones similar to the typical subspecies but with on average fewer seeds (2-)3-4(-6) and sometimes larger (diam. up to 14 mm in e.g. R. Dunckelman 46 from Gardez, Afghanistan), more variable in size.” (Farjon 1992).
Sparsely located throughout Gilgit-Baltistan. Albania, Yugoslavia (Macedonia), Greece (Macedonia, Thraki and Euboea), S Bulgaria, Turkey (Anatolia and eastward to Armenia), Cyprus, Syria, Lebanon, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran (Elburz Mts.) to near Ashkhabad (Kopet Mts.) in Turkmenia, Afghanistan, Pakistan (Baluchistan), Tadzhikistan, Uzbekistan, and India (Himachal Pradesh) (Farjon 1992). Hardy to Zone 6 (cold hardiness limit between -23.2°C and -17.8°C) (Bannister and Neuner 2001).
