Green Indonesia

Indonesia has possibly the most diverse biodiversity of any nation on Earth. Green Indonesia believes that this country has a duty to protect Nature’s environment for the benefit of all living creatures, both now and in the future. If we don’t, then we can expect our planet to be downgraded to that of Pluto, now a mere uninhabitable ’dwarf’. 

Green Indonesia is pleased to announce that Dave Jardine, well-known raconteur, author, quizmaster and twitcher will from henceforth be the volunteer co-ordinator of this category of this ‘café blog’. For the purposes of receiving news and views he will be known as Faunacator and can be emailed here.

Flora
Indonesia’s abundant flora has more than 30.000 flowering plant species, from the well-known begonias and busy lizzies to tropical exotica such as jacaranda, hibiscus and ginger. Some of the most striking are rhododendrons. They are found growing in large numbers in the montane forest, where the flaring colours of their flamboyant blooms splash across the scenery.

Thousands of orchid species have been discovered throughout the islands and many have still to be identified. The myriad of orchids are rich in species, varying in size from the largest of all orchids, the tiger orchid of Grammatophyllum Speciosum, to the tiny and leafless species of Taeniophyllum which is edible and taken by the local people as a medicine and is also used in handicrafts. The orchid species are usually epiphytic, in bright or pastel hues, striped and spotted, intricately formed, they are one of the country’s glories.

The rich flora of Indonesia includes many unique varieties of tropical plant life in various forms. Rafflesia Arnoldi, which is only found in certain parts of Sumatra, is the largest flower in the world. The parasitic plant grows on certain lianas but does not produce leaves. In the World Environment Day Ceremonial, in June 1995, President Soeharto declared three flowers as Indonesia’s national flowers: the melati (small white sweet smelling flower), the angrek bulan (moon orchid) and the Raflesia Arnoldi, named after Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles and Dr. Arnold. People directly or indirectly use about 6,000 species of plants in the production of traditional herbal medicine or jamu. Flowers are indispensable in ceremonial, customary and traditional rites.

Fauna
Indonesia contains one of the world’s most remarkable geographical boundaries in its distribution of animals. This dates back to the glacial period when the sea level fell all over the world. During this period the islands of Java, Sumatra, Kalimantan and Bali on the Sunda Shelf were joined together with one another and the Asian mainland, but Irian Jaya, Aru and the Australian continent of the Sahul Shelf were separated. This early geographical separation explains why the tropical animal species of Java, Sumatra and Kalimantan do not exist in Irian Jaya. For the same reason, the kangoroo of Irian Jaya is missing in the other region. Maluku, Sulawesi, and the Lesser Sunda Islands, which lie between the Sunda and Sahul shelves, have a strikingly different fauna. Most of the eastern fauna do not exist in Sulawesi even though this island is close to Kalimantan, being just across the Makassar Strait.

One possible reason for this is that Kalimantan and Sulawesi might have been separated by a deep straight at one point, while the great depth of the Banda Sea kept them apart during the glacial period. Some scientists have attributed the phenomenon to three faunial lines. Alfred Russel Wallace (1823-1913) wrote in his book, “The Malay Archipelago”, that Nusantara was separated into the Oriental ecological area and the Australian ecological area by a line (now known as the Wallace Line) that runs from the South to North, passing the Lombok and Makassar Straits and ending in the south eastern part of The Philippines.