Kew Gardens – Indien
Anna-Lena Tack hat ihre Ausbildung zur Gärtnerin im Botanischen Garten in Bonn absolviert. Im Jahr 2014 hat sie ihre Weiterbildung zum Kew Diploma im Royal Botanic Garden Kew begonnen. Teil dieser Studien ist auch ein selbstorganisierter Auslandsaufenthalt, für den auch die finanziellen Mittel selbst organisiert werden müssen. Als Ziel Ihres Auslandsaufenthaltes hat sie Indien gewählt – und hier den Schwerpunkt der medizinisch verwendeten Pflanzen.
Sie hatte vor Ort einen Führer, der ihr erklärte, man müsse sich immer eine Geschichte oder Verwendung zu den Pflanzen merken – nur so könne man eine Pflanze kennenlernen und sich auch merken. Das scheint so zu sein, denn Frau Tack fängt in ihrem Bericht gleich damit an, sie Verwendungen oder Geschichten zu den Pflanzen zu notieren:
Botanical Survey of India (BSI) is a governmental institution; I had a tour through their outside area where amongst others the following plants where shown and explained:
- Santalum album – high value as timber (tropical hardwood) and has been smuggeled a lot in the past
- Asparagus adscendens – the oil derived from the seeds is used against skin abscises and this plant is used for biodiesel
- Acacia catechu – chewed it is useful for teeth hygiene and used as a die for reddish walls
- Bixa orellana – used as the red dot on women’s forehead
- Sapindus mukorossi – used as a hair wash
- Trachycarpus – used dried in Currys
- Xanthoxylum – used for a good mouth hygiene, seeds are chewed and the bark is used as a toothbrush
Von der Tagestour zum Himalaya berichtet sie:
It could be clearly seen, as Amit explained to me, that there are the south facing slopes which are generally much steeper and have less vegetation due to too high temperatures. The north facing slopes on the other hand are not as steep and are much more dense populated by Quercus and Cupressus species, especially in higher altitudes much more conifers are found. With higher altitudes and a more temperate climate, we started to see loads of Rhododendron which was amazing. Amit said this species is predominantly Rhododendron arboreum, but that there are more than 60 species found in the eastern Himalayas.
Centre for Aromatic Plants: The Centre of Aromatic Plants (CAP) is a governmental organisation that is specialised in plants that are used for essential oils. The main objectives of this organisation are to promote conservation, cultivation, processing and quality assessment of plants that are used for essential oils, to teach this knowledge to local farmers and to develop market linkages for these farmers to secure their life. Cap is focused on ca. 13 commercial plants that are widely used in the aroma industry. On a tour through their outside area we saw plants such as Cymbopogon flexuosus (lemongrass), Pogostemon cablin (patchouli) and Melissa officinalis (lemonbalm).
Zusammenfassend schreibt sie:
Obviously, one needs to keep in mind what a big country India is and how little two weeks are to investigate such a big topic as medicinal plants. But even in those 2 weeks, I felt I really learned about how different people’s relationships to plants are. I learned, that a lot of people in India still rely a lot on small scale horticulture, which could be seen by all the fields we found in the Himalayas and driving through the cities, as every little bit of land was used to grow crops such as for example rice. Visiting for example the ethnomedicinal garden has shown, that there is a market for medicinal plants in both a purposeful way, such as in the hospital, as well as in an ornamental way of creating designs with medicinal plants.
