Trang (14)

2004: at the BKF herbarium in Bangkok I found a specimen labelled "N. gracilis" that was coming from 12 Km east of Trang. Then two specimens labelled "N. mirabilis": one from Khao Chong Park, 20 km east of Trang, and one from the Thung Khai Botanic Garden. Then at the Chulalongkorn herbarium there was this specimen, similar to N. "Viking", found 4 Km west of Trang in 1979 (see the dry specimen here and more infos in The Trip page, in the section about the Chulalongkorn herbarium). In 2006 at the BK herbarium in Bangkok I found a specimen of N. mirabilis coming from Ban Sak, in the Trang province.

2006: I went to Trang. It’s a very bad looking city, to my opinion at least, but I have to confess that I didn’t see much of it. I just walked around for about 3-4 km. Not many places to eat (usually thai cities are covered with food shops!) and the general look was grey and dirty, and at 8 pm it was really hard to find anything open. I found a horrible hotel, where all the rooms had a broken, old, dirty and dark look. Probably the worse room I’ve ever seen in Thailand. Every time I was leaving my room, a fat, 50 years old lady, half naked and lying down on his bed, always watching tv, in the room next to mine, used to smile and wave at me, always keeping her door open. Bleah.

I tried to be as fast as possible with my research, as I just wanted to leave that place. I went 4 km west of Trang, as there’s a big road that goes right that way. I found some humid areas, but no nepenthes. To make my job easier, I went to a college, 5 km west of the city. I asked a teacher and she asked the director. They had never seen the mokao in the area (actually the director told me they were growing around there but then they were “flooded”. Boh!). They suggested me to ask at the Sapparachini School, which was 1 km far and exactly 4 km west of Trang.

I went there and I was told to ask, the following day, to Mrs. Rattanà, the biology teacher, who seemed to be in some way interested in the local flora and fauna. The following morning I took a taxi motorbike and I went straight to speak with the teacher. She was quite young and good looking! And her English wasn’t bad. But she didn’t know anything about mokao plants growing around there. I gave her my email address, but without many hopes.

Then I looked at the map of Trang that I had been given at my hotel, as it was now time to go east. On my south map you can see that going east you just meet the Khao Pu Khao Ya np. This park wasn’t on the hotel map though. But more or less in the same area were both Khao Chong and Thung Khai. I started going to Khao Chong (N. mirabilis), 20 km east. But they told me “no mokao sorry”, and they said that in Thung Khai I would have found what I was looking for. Actually I didn’t want to go to Thung Khai (N. mirabilis), as I was more interested in knowing what there was 12 km from Trang (N. gracilis), and so 8 km west of Khao Chong. I pretended I wasn’t looking for the mokao this time (otherwise, believe me, they would just go on saying “Thung Khai, Thung Khai”, there’s no way to have a dialogue) and I asked what there was 8 km from there, west direction. They said “Na Yong”. I went to the park exit, looking for some lift to go back just for 8 km. A luxury Volkswagen came out of the park and stopped. The driver later told me he was the director of a Physiology Institute.

He had eaten Nepenthes pitchers filled with sticky rice the previous week, so we both found our meeting quite curious. As he had a good English I was able to explain why I was going 8 km west. But I had no idea about where to go exactly, so we both decided that the Na Yong school was the best place to ask. My friend seemed to be well known and respected by the school staff. One of the teachers told him where she had seen some mokao and explained how to reach the place. On the way, the director told me he knew this place, and to his opinion it was exactly 12 km east of Trang and it had to be what I was looking for. We arrived and I read on the sign “Thung Khai Botanic Garden”.

Well, if the fate was bringing me there with so much insistence, I had no more reason to fight against it. But now, looking on the web, I saw that Thung Khai is 11 km south of Trang, so my ideas are still confused. And in Thung Khai I didn’t know if I had to expect N. mirabilis (as the BKF said) or gracilis (as the director “said”, saying that this place was 12 km east of Trang). What I found was even more confusing. The director spoke with the main responsible of the Botanic Garden (this is a wildlife reserve more than a botanic garden, there are no greenhouses), Mr. Voradol, and told him what I was looking for. Then he left, after all my thanks of course. I went upstairs with Voradol to have some coffee and, as he also had a good English, I explained once again why I was looking for Nepenthes right there and not somewhere else. With my great surprise he asked me if I knew Mr. Martin Cheek. To my affirmative reply he explained that M. Cheek had been there five years before to identify that plant. Seeing how Voradol was actually more informed than I thought, I told him that I was expecting N. gracilis and not N. mirabilis, and he said that as far as he could remember Cheek identified that species as N. gracilis, not N. mirabilis at all.

I was quite excited, as finally I had found the first location for N. gracilis in Thailand. We had a walk to the mokao place. On the way Voradol stopped and pointed at a little open area in the jungle. Nepenthes! Just maybe 10 plants, about 1 metre tall, but…not N. gracilis at all! And…actually not even exactly N. mirabilis! What was that? I show you the first pitcher I saw, the one that started giving me some doubts: pic1.

I know, it has much in common with N. mirabilis, but what surprised me is that all the plants in the park had red pitchers, even when growing in shade. And the leaves and stems were thinner than in N. mirabilis, and with longer tendrils. We walked for another few tens metres and he showed me some plants growing in full sun, in drier sandy soil, just around 20 cm tall, with some cows eating grass around them: pic1.

Then we followed an educative trail and on the sides I could see some more Nepenthes. Here they were growing in very wet soil, so that some of them had the base of their stems submerged for a few centimetres. That’s were I saw the tallest plants, climbing on some trees up to 5 metres. What gave me the impression that I was in front of something new is this pitcher here: pic1. It’s clearly something in between N. mirabilis and N. Viking. But even taxonomists aren’t sure when it comes to classify plants like N. echinostoma or Viking. Are they new species or N. mirabilis varieties? I can only try to spread this N. “Thung Khai” in cultivation and hope that, as it happened with N. Viking, some botanist will follow the right procedure to classify it in one way or the other (latest news: Voradol, despite his great kindness while I was there, and promises to help me with new seeds and photos, never answered to my 5-6 emails; my agent in Thailand called him and he said that he “can’t give any information” to me “because of the protocol”. I don’t know why he changed his mind but you’re all invited to try to get some seeds or cuttings to introduce this precious thing in cultivation!). Here some upper pitchers: pic1, pic2. And here is one plant growing in partial shade: pic1.

As I said the best plants were not in the deep, humid jungle and not even in the most exposed and sunny areas. They grew where a lot of sun but also a lot of water were available. The few plants in flower were always at least 1.5 metres tall. There was a good number of plants and they are well protected for sure, as this area can be visited only with someone from the staff. Voradol also reminded me about the CITES, and that also means he knows what kind of plant genus they are dealing with. He invited me for a very good lunch at his home, inside the park, where his mother prepared a very good meal, including the final sweet, jelly sticky rice dipped in cane sugar. Then we went back to his office with a pick up, which he left to someone else from the staff, who then brought me back to Trang. Well, that was enough and not too bad for one day of travelling around, so I deserved to leave that place as soon as possible. And in fact after about half an hour I was at the station, waiting for the bus to Satun. A couple of questions were still in my mind: was the Thung Khai plant the same plant found 4 km west of Trang in 1979? Where is the N. gracilis growing 12 km east of Trang?

2007: This time I went to the Ko Teng hotel, at the second place in my Lonely Planet list, where I got a very nice, clean and well lighted room for just 180 bat. I arrived in town at lunch time and, after a quick fried rice, I visited a few tourist agencies to find a map of the province. At the Hat Yai herbarium in fact I had found two interesting specimens, very similar to the strange N. mirabilis form of Thung Khai, coming from the Khao Chong Park (where I had been in 2006 without finding anything) and from a village near Trang. I immediately thought that the latter could be the place “4 km west of Trang” where some strange globosa-like plants had been found in 1979. Very soon I was told by a girl working in one of those agencies that the village was in fact just 3 km west of Trang, so I was now sure that it was the right place. Being so close, I went there by motorbike taxi. At the village I paid for the motorbike and then I asked in three or four shops; eventually a very old lady brought me to a young girl, who could speak a little English; she asked around and then she made a map of where I could find the mokao; but then again a bricklayer who was working on her house said he could bring me there by motorbike straight away if I wanted to. I can say in that occasion the local people saved my day, with their kindness and their way of helping and asking each other on and on until they solve a problem. We arrived quite close to the Sapparachini School. There we checked a sandy bog without finding anything. Then we went in another one, on the opposite side of the road. Here the bricklayer didn’t even have the time to show me the first pitcher, as I had already realized we were in a bog full of Nepenthes. I ran to check the lower pitchers. Yes! They looked amazing! I thanked my friend jumping with happiness, and I moved my hands to say that now he could just go and live me there, as I could find my way back by myself. The plants were really like those in Thung Khai, but here…they were all like the most extreme form you can find over there! Look at these: pic1, pic2, pic3, pic4. I had found the same place visited by someone in 1979! I checked one of the flowers; it was a female, with the seed capsules already open. I looked in front of me, as now I knew what to look for, and the area was in fact covered with those spikes. The soil wasn’t very wet, but for sure it was sandy. I guess there were about 200 adult plants. After taking a few pictures (maybe I spent about one hour there, but you know it’s hard to understand how long you stay in a place in such a situation) I went back on the main road where I stopped a young girl, who brought me back to the Ko Teng hotel with her motorbike. At the hotel I checked the lid of one of those pitchers, which I had cut and taken with me as a memory. It had no glands along the mid line, but a lot of them on both sides of it. It also had a very small swelling on its underside, close to the tip. The same swelling had been observed on N. globosa by Trent Meeks. He also checked some N. mirabilis and they had no swelling at all, and their glands were equally scattered all over the lid’s underside. Here in Thailand I found typical N. mirabilis with both kinds of lid though, including sometimes a very small swelling. Leaving the lid problem on one side until further studies, we can conclude that the plants of N. mirabilis, labelled by M. Cheek “Trang bizarre variants” and coming from some areas of the Trang province, became closer and closer to N. globosa in their evolution. N. rowanae, N. globosa and N. mirabilis “Trang” provide a proof of the fact that the “red & round” variation of N. mirabilis, for some reason, works better and is “promptly” available in the DNA of this species.

The following day I tried again with Khao Chong. The Trang bizarre had been found between 100 and 300 metres. I spoke with the very kind park responsible, who introduced me to Toon, a young, smart guy with very good English. He brought me around asking all the staff members and rangers if they knew anything about mokao growing in Khao Chong. In the mean time I was told that in 1981 (two years after the specimen was collected!) all the hills surrounding the park collapsed in a gigantic landslide. Such a terrible disaster changed completely the geography of the territory, even the course of the river. The reasons of the collapse are purely human. The roots of the trees that used to cover these hills were in fact used to produce an essence. But they were also holding and keeping the soil firm. The massive uprooting and then the rainy season caused the landslide. As the nepenthes in 1979 were growing between 100 and 300 metres, I guess they were located near the waterfalls, where the plain gradually becomes steeper and the mountains start. And that’s the place that was covered by the landslide. We went to see the rangers near the mountains; they had seen some mokao in the nearby forest and they were so kind to bring us there. After one hour spent following impossible passages in the deep jungle, we arrived to a clearing, where among a lot of grass a few plain, greenish, suffering N. mirabilis were growing shaded by some trees. I showed the photos of the previous day, to show the rangers how unfortunately that wasn’t the plant I was looking for. Toon was so kind that, after a good coffee at the Khao Chong headquarter together with the boss, he brought me back to Trang. Before that we made a stop over at Thung Khai, to meet Mr. Voradol. He had just finished his lesson; I left him all the photos I had taken in the previous weeks, telling him about the plants at the village near Trang, so similar to those in Thung Khai; I asked for the photos he had taken at Phu Pha Mek (see the south map); he said his pictures of those N. gracilis were in Bangkok and I had to ask there. In Bangkok I asked Mr. Pooma to send them to me, but one month later he wrote me that Voradol doesn’t want him to do that. This is the second time something like that happens with Voradol. I’ll leave to you any conclusion. At the BKF in Bangkok, some weeks later, I cleared up the matter of the only problematic Trang specimen left; the “N. gracilis, 12 km east of Trang” was coming from a place called…Thung Khai! And they were in fact N. mirabilis. My fault, I had to read the specimen’s label more carefully in 2004. So, in the Trang province we have three locations for N. mirabilis “bizarre”, one of these locations having been destroyed by a landslide. Then we have N. gracilis on the Banthat mountains and some typical N. mirabilis here and there.

2008: I went to the old bog near the city to see how the Vikings were growing, to take some more photos and some seeds. How sad I was seeing that the first traces of roads have been excavated in the bog (pic1, pic2, pic3); big, long holes in the white sand, rounded by hundreds of dead pitcher plants. I also saw a villager, with naked feet and short jeans, walking around with a big bag. I was curious to see what he was doing, as a part from pitcher plants, there's nothing interesting in that grassy field. And in fact I realized that he was collecting pitchers! With not much delicacy really, he was basically taking a single pitcher with his fingers, then pulling it away until the tendril was broken, without even cutting or curling the tendril around his finger to break it! I was surprised to see how the plants were not coming out of the soil with the whole root system! Try to do that with your plants, I think you'll find even the biggest pot hanging from your hand, together with plant and tendril! Anyway, he wasn't damaging the plants, a part from the pitchers, so I let him do. He was probably going to use them to cook some rice. It was time to go back to the hotel; as soon as I saw a couple of young girls, I stopped them and I tried to see if there was any way to go back to the main road with their motorbike. For twenty minutes - of course they could not speak English - I had to stand in front of their laughs and silences. They didn't just say "no English, no English". They tried desperately to tell me something, and they were just laughing or staying in silence, probably thinking about which English words they had to use to explain themselves. But still I wonder: if you don't speak a word of English, why staying in silence for 20 minutes trying to find the right words?! They tried to make me drive, I said no, but I realized that they were not good at driving. One of them jumped in the front of the motorbike, the other one was driving, and I was sitting on the back. Very slowly we proceeded out of the lot, towards the main road. The girl was driving on the side of the road, very slowly, to avoid an accident. That was good. But not enough. From a few ten metres I realized that a long car in front of us had just parked with its front on the walking side, and part of the back on the road, the same road side where we were driving. not a problem for cars driving along the centre of the main road, but we were on the left side, to close to the walking side. I saw the girl had her head straight, so I guess she was looking straight in front of herself. But I realized that she wasn't decreasing the speediness. So I moved her shoulders and said "oh!". No answer. "Ooohh!". No answer. "OOOOOOHH!!!!!". Bum. When I think about that now, I know it would have been so easy to just jump back from the motorbike and fall down, without much damage. But in those moments you don't know what it's going to happen. You expect the driver to see the car and eventually drive away from it. Who knows where that idiot girl was looking, who knows if she had her head straight but her eyes closed, who knows why she ignored the crazy, shouting falang. Bum. Everything, everyone in the air. A few seconds of silence. I moved my head, moved my arms and tried to sit and look around. I was still alive and I could move. Good. In front of me, a broken motorbike, pieces of plastic and metal here and there, no blood, a few people running towards us, the two girls sitting on the ground like me, scared to death and wondering what the hell had happened. My nose was hurting, my ass too. The girl sitting in the front of the motorbike was holding her own arm, probably broken. The girl who was driving was the lucky one. Basically she was among two pillows, while I had two in front of me and my backpack behind, that saved my brain. The head of the driver went against my face during the impact; fortunately I had my sun glasses, but for a couple of days my nose was twice bigger than usual, and probably now it has a different shape. My ass was also ok in two or three days, during which I couldn't walk very well. Both girls were immediately brought to the hospital. Touching my nose, and walking in a funny way, I left the place, thinking "…that's part of the job...I'm still alive...I'm still alive, man...that's just part of the job…". After a few hundred metres I stopped a motorbike taxi that brought me back to the hotel. "Slow man!...Slow...". We say in Italy that if you had an accident riding a horse, you're better start riding another one as soon as possible, if you don't want to fear horses for the rest of your life. But still, even before that accident, and even today, boats, cars, airplanes, motorbikes...the sooner I'm back on my feet, in front of cobras or whatever, and the better it is.