The name was not very common to my ears neither was its look to my eyes. Ever since I saw them at the Aspire Park in Doha, I might has asked
my Landscape Architect friend umpteen number of times to remind me of the name
of this tree. He used to give me the name with the questions, “why, what
happened?” I always wanted to know more about them.
I am told that we have a few of the species in some
botanical gardens in India but incidentally never got to see one. “There
are nine
species of baobab in the world, and Madagascar, one of the world’s
biodiversity hotspots, is home to six. The African mainland and the Arabian
peninsula have two, and Australia has one. Africa’s most notable species is
the Adansonia digitata, named after the French botanist Michel
Adanson, who undertook an 18th-century exploration of Senegal. He stayed there
for five years and contributed to the publication of 1757’s Natural History of
Senegal.” theguardian.com)
The shape of the trees are fascinating but the most fascinating
fact is that there are individual Baobab trees alive on the planet earth for the
last 3000 years. Yes you have counted the zeros alright, its three thousands!
Isn’t it amazing for somebody to stand the sand of time and witness
the continued changes happening over the millenniums? But they are not able to
withstand our atrocities any longer.
A recent article made the shocking
disclosure that as many as 9 of these individuals aged between 1100 and 2500
years are dying off. Unfortunately our way of polluting environment and encroaching
forest lands is killing them. Victims of Climate Change! The Guardian reported “The
oldest tree by far, of which all the stems collapsed in 2010/11, was the Panke
tree in Zimbabwe, estimated to have existed for 2,500 years. The biggest,
dubbed Holboom, was from Namibia. It stood 30.2 metres (99 feet) tall and had a
girth of 35.1 m.” (theguardian.com)
Do you not feel that it's about time that we change our way of life and give others a chance?
Live and Let Live!
