China News Service Chengdu, September 6 Title: Why does "plant hunter" Wilson call China the "mother of the world's gardens"?
——Interview with Yin Kaipu, a researcher at the Chengdu Institute of Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
China News Service reporter He Shaoqing
Lilies are popular in European and American gardens, but at present, the mother of all European and American lilies is almost all derived from the Chinese Minjiang lily; The rose, which symbolizes love in the West, is actually a variety of European roses that have crossed with chinese moons; New Zealand's national business card kiwi fruit was born from China...
How has the "plant hunter" whose mission is to collect exotic flowers and trees changed the distribution of plants in the world for thousands of years? Why does the famous "plant hunter" Wilson call China the "mother of the world's gardens"? Yin Kaipu, author of "A Century of Pursuit - Witnessing Environmental Change in Western China" and researcher at the Chengdu Institute of Biology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, was recently interviewed by China News Agency's "East and West Question" to make an in-depth interpretation of this.
The interview transcript is summarized below:
China News Service reporter: "Plant hunters" to collect exotic flowers and trees as a mission, this low-key and mysterious, not well-known profession, how to change the distribution of plants in the world?
At present, it is generally believed that "plant hunters" originated in Europe in the 17th century. The emergence of this profession has been controversial to this day, with mostly negative comments on it, believing that it steals rare plants from other countries and destroys the environment in which plants grow, but the existence of "plant hunters" is not so.
Plant resources are the common wealth of all mankind, and since the emergence of "plant hunters", they have brought about a worldwide plant migration. Lilies are popular in European and American gardens, but at present, the mother of all European and American lilies is almost all derived from the Chinese Minjiang lily; The rose, which symbolizes love in the West, is actually a variety of European roses that have crossed with chinese moons; New Zealand's national business card kiwi fruit was born from China; The main tree in The Arnold Arboretum at Harvard University is a blood maple imported from China.
Wilson introduced the Blood Maple (Acer griseum) from Shennongjia, Hubei Province, to arnold Arnold Arboretum in the United States in 1906. China News Service issued a photo by Kaipu
When Chinese plants were introduced to the West in large quantities, China also introduced a large number of grain and vegetable varieties from the West, becoming the largest beneficiary country. Wheat, the staple food of the northern Chinese people, came from the two river basins in Western Asia; Chinese the corn and potatoes on the table, from North America, Mexico and South America, respectively, these food crops have fed hundreds of millions of people in china's mountainous areas in difficult times; The favorite vegetable pepper of southern China also came from Mexico.
At present, "plant hunters" around the world are legalized, but it is not excluded that they will be used by unscrupulous people for personal gain. Becoming a qualified "plant hunter" is not an easy task, in addition to the knowledge of botany and horticulture, you must also have knowledge of history, geography, archaeology, etc., as well as a spirit of adventure and dedication.
China News Service: Why does Wilson, the "plant hunter," call China the "mother of the world's gardens"? Why does Wilson's "Garden of Western China" have such a great appeal to the West?
British horticulturist and botanist Ernest Henry Wilson is the most legendary "plant hunter", with exotic trees named after him in gardens around the world. From 1899 to 1918, Wilson went to China five times to collect plants, four of which went to western China, collecting more than 65,000 plant specimens including more than 4,700 species of plants, and brought 1,593 plant seeds and 168 plant slices to the West, known as "the people who opened the garden of western China".
In the 18th century, Western horticulturists studied a large number of cultivated flowers introduced in China and concluded that China was the "central flower country". On the basis of collecting Chinese plant experience, Wilson further emphasized the great contribution of Chinese native flower plants to the world's gardens by summarizing and summarizing the achievements of predecessors. In 1913, Wilson published A Naturalist in Western China in England. In 1929, when the book was republished in the United States, it was renamed "China: Mother of Gardens" (China).
Wilson's Chinese translation of China: The Mother of the World's Gardens.
Wilson summed up the famous thesis that China is the "central flower country" proposed by his predecessors, and on this basis, he first put forward the famous thesis of "China - the mother of the world's gardens", which was widely recognized by the world horticultural community.
In his book, Wilson notes that "there is no garden in the temperate region of the entire Northern Hemisphere that does not cultivate several plants of Chinese origin" "China is also home to citrus, lemons, citrons, peaches, apricots, and so-called 'European walnuts'" "We should fairly see that Western gardens have benefited deeply from East Asia, and this benefit will grow over time" "Many rhododendrons, formerly known as India and Mauritius, and many other beautiful flowers, are native to China" Without the imports from China earlier, our gardens and related floral resources would be pitiful today. These new ideas of his are still recognized by western horticultural circles to this day.
China News Service: Which well-known plants were introduced to the West by Wilson from China and became the "protagonists" in Western gardens?
Yinkaipu: About 80 species of lily plants in the world and about 40 species in China. The Lilium regale, native to the arid valley region of the upper Min River in western Sichuan, China, is one of the most important, also known as "imperial lilies," discovered and named by Wilson.
Minjiang lily grows in a harsh environment and has strong disease resistance. In 1910, Wilson introduced it to the West at a time when the Western lily was in danger of extinction as a virus spread. The introduction of the Minjiang lily enabled horticulturists in Europe and the United States to cultivate many new varieties of antiviral lilies, saved the western lily cultivation industry, and made the world's gardens more elegant. In search of minjiang lilies, Wilson encountered a landslide in Caopo Township, Wenchuan County, Sichuan Province, on September 3, 1910, and was severed by stones flying down the mountain on his right calf, becoming permanently disabled. Not only did he not regret it, but he also jokingly called himself a "lily cripple".
A photo of Minjiang Lily by Wilson.
Now Minjiang Lily. China News Service issued a photo by Kaipu
There are about 200 species of rose plants in the world and about 82 species in China. Due to the difference in morphology, there are roses, moon seasons and roses, of which the moon season is called "the queen of flowers". Chinese rose plants are highly valued by the Western horticultural community, and they use Chinese wild species and original varieties to cross and breed many beautiful modern new varieties. Wilson introduced 18 species of roses from China, including the Southwest Rose (Rosa murielae), named after his daughter, the R.helenae named after his wife, and the multi-flowered long-leafed rose (R. sino-wilsonii), named after his nickname "Wilson of China".
Rosa chinensis var. spontanea, the original species of the moonflower, discovered and introduced by Wilson in Sichuan Ba in 1910, and cross-bred a new modern rose variety. Photo by Gao Xinfen, China News Service
Rhododendrons occupy an important place in horticulture and are known in the West as "nobles in the garden". As early as 100 years ago, a large number of Western "plant hunters" flocked to the alpine valleys of China's Hengduan Mountain region in search of rhododendrons, of which Wilson introduced more than 60 species. In his writings, he praised the azaleas: "Traveling to the mountains of western China during the rhododendron season and enjoying beautiful gatherings is far better than going to other parts of the world." No wonder some people call the landscape avenue of Chinese, National Highway 318, the "Rhododendron Road."
Under the 3,400-meter-high Quercus pannosa forest on the western slope of Gongga Mountain in Sichuan, Rhododendron gonggashanense and Rhododendron vernicosum grow, the forest here is decorated as a natural garden. Photo by Zhou Huaming, China News Service
China News Service: What is the difference between the "plant hunters" in the new era and the past, how have they escaped time to save endangered plants, and what achievements have they achieved?
In the past, the main purpose of western "plant hunters" was to find species with ornamental and economic value, and there are similarities between "plant hunters" in the new era and Western "plant hunters", and there are more improvements, mainly reflected in the protection of the species itself.
With the increase of population in recent decades, human production and life have a great impact on the natural environment and species. According to relevant data, 3500 babies are born every 20 minutes in the world today, but 1 or more species of flora and fauna go extinct. At this rate, 72 species are extinct from The Earth every day, and about 27,000 species a year, are extinct forever.
As one of the countries with the largest number of higher plant species in the world, the Chinese government and international NGOs have done a lot of work to save rare and endangered plants. China has formulated and published a red list of protected endangered species, on the basis of which the existential crisis of China's wild endangered plants has been alleviated through the establishment of nature reserves and national parks for in situ protection, the introduction of wild plants to ex situ protection in botanical gardens, and the establishment of a "wild plant germplasm resource bank".
Field trips. Courtesy of Chengdu Institute of Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
China News Service: You have spent six years re-embarking on Wilson's western China road, what are your most impressive discoveries?
Yin Kaipu: After 7 years of preparation, since 2004, I have followed the route that Wilson has taken, more than a dozen times into Hubei, Chongqing, sichuan, looking for the shooting location where Wilson left old photos, and re-taking photos at the original shooting locations, comparing images, in order to truly show the environmental changes in western China over the past century.
In the past one hundred years, the environment in western China has indeed undergone tremendous changes, especially since the large-scale development of the western region, the ecological protection projects implemented by China such as natural forest protection, returning farmland to forest, returning grazing land to grassland, afforestation of barren mountains and soil erosion control in small watersheds, have greatly improved the environment in western China. A series of infrastructure construction and people's livelihood projects have given a new look to the poor and backward appearance of western China in the past.
However, we also see some unsatisfactory points in the comparative photos, and over the past hundred years, until today, the behavior of sacrificing the environment for the pursuit of short-term interests has occurred from time to time in some areas. All of this is worth studying and thinking about, warning us that our future actions should bear more historical responsibility. (End)
Respondent Profiles:
Yin Kaipu, a researcher at the Chengdu Institute of Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences. China News Service reporter Zhang Lang photographed
Yin Kaipu, a former researcher and ecologist at the Chengdu Institute of Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, is the author of "A Century of Pursuit of ---- Witnessing Environmental Change in Western China". Yin Kaipu has been engaged in biodiversity conservation and biological resources investigation for more than 60 years, starting from drawing vegetation maps, participating in a number of scientific investigations such as Sichuan vegetation, Sichuan potato resources, Hengduan Mountain vegetation, etc., running all over the landscapes and rivers of the Sichuan Basin, and finding a variety of rare plants such as the "giant panda" five-leaf maple in the plant kingdom that is considered extinct. When Jiuzhaigou was still little known, Yin Kaipu proposed the establishment of a nature reserve in 1978, and he was one of the original names of the Aden nature reserve plan. In the 1970s, Yin Kaipu participated in the writing of proposals to establish more than 20 nature reserves in Sichuan, including Dafengding, Jiuzhaigou, Gongga Mountain, and Siguniang Mountain.