Plants Do Make a Difference

This blog will feature some people around the world that made a difference through planting flora. I have always believed in the importance of plants not only for air and food but also animal habitats. Read on to learn about some amazing people who made a difference. I admire the dedication of these individuals to change the world.

Moyenne Island is a small island (9.9 ha or 24 acres) in the Sainte Anne Marine National Park off the north coast of Mahé, Seychelles. Since the 1970s onwards, it has been a flora and fauna reserve. From 1915 until the 1960s, the island was abandoned until its purchase by Brendon Grimshaw for about 10,000 dollars. He was a newspaper editor from Dewsbury in Yorkshire, England.

The island’s name was derived from the French moyenne, “middle.” It was supposedly used by pirates in the 18th and 19th centuries and contains two graves called pirate graves.

When he first arrived at Moyenne, the island — abandoned for over 50 years — was overgrown with shrubbery so dense that coconuts could not fall to the ground.

Grimshaw and local youth René Antoine Lafortune planted sixteen thousand trees by hand, including 700 mahogany trees that have grown to reach 60-70 feet in height -built 3 mi of nature paths,

Grimshaw brought and bred Aldabra giant tortoises, intending to create an island of extraordinary beauty. Apart from a wide variety of plant and bird life, the island is home to around 120 giant tortoises. In 2012, according to Grimshaw, the eldest was 76, and was named Desmond, after his godson.

After 20 years of persistence, Grimshaw and his assistant Lafortune achieved their goal of making Moyenne Island a national park in its own right, separate from the circumjacent Sainte Anne Marine National Park. The island is now known as the Moyenne Island National Park. The island is 2 1⁄2 nautical miles away from the main island

Almost hunted to total extinction in the early 1900s, the giant tortoise — though indigenous to the Seychelles — continues to be at risk on most of the other islands.

Grimshaw’s island now also holds more than two thirds of all endemic plants to the Seychelles.

A 47-year-old man in Manipur’s Imphal West district has converted barren land into a 300-acre forest with a wide variety of plant species in 20 years.

Grimshaw was the only inhabitant of the island until his death in July 2012. The island is now a national park and can be visited as part of organized trips.

MULAI FOREST

Mulai Kathoni or Mulai Forest, a 550 acre man-made forest located at Kokilamukh, a village of Jorhat. Jadav Mulai Payeng, “the forest man of India”, who is behind this exceptional work, upgraded a ‘chapori’ of the river Brahmaputra to this forest. All this effort was made by him after witnessing a sad incident of a dying snake due to lack of vegetation in the area.

After an initial 500 acre by the social forestry division of Golaghat district was abandoned in 1983, the forest was single-handedly attended by Payeng for 30 years and now encompasses an area of about 1,360 acres. Payeng planted and tended trees on a sandbar of Majuli island in the Brahmaputra River, eventually becoming a forest reserve. He single-handedly transformed the entire region which led to the reoccurrence of wildlife here.

Molai forest now houses Bengal tigers, Indian rhinoceros, over 100 deer and rabbits besides monkeys and several varieties of birds, including a large number of vultures. There are several thousand trees, including valcol, arjun (Terminalia arjuna), Pride of India (Lagerstroemia speciosa), royal poinciana (Delonix regia), silk trees (Albizia procera), moj (Archidendron bigeminum) and cotton trees (Bombax ceiba). Bamboo covers an area of over 700 acres

A herd of around 100 elephants regularly visits the forest every year and generally stays for around six months. They have given birth to 10 calves in the forest.

Imphal

A 47-year-old man in Manipur’s Imphal West district has converted barren land into a 300-acre forest with a wide variety of plant species.

Moirangthem Loiya, who hails from Uripok Khaidem Leikai area of the district, started planting trees on the outskirts of Imphal town in the Langol Hill range about 20 years ago.

A nature lover from his childhood, Loiya told PTI, in early 2000 he went to the Koubru mountain.  He was appalled by the wide scale deforestation of the previously thick vegetation that marked the Koubru hill ranges. He felt a strong urge to give back to Mother Nature.

The site served as a home for him for six years, as he lived in isolation in a hut. He planted bamboo, oak, jackfruit trees and teaks while nurturing the area previously destroyed by human activities.

There are more than 100 species of plants, around 25 varieties of bamboo species in the 300 acre forest which is also home to barking deer’s, porcupines and snakes, forest officials said.

This link is to an article about Yellowstone. Wolf Reintroduction Changes Yellowstone Ecosystem (yellowstonepark.com) It as is about groups of people that changed a massive area. I wanted to include it due to the amazing change that was made.

How will you make a difference in the world with plants.

#makeadifference