D. indica with its' petals still intact

Just want to add in a few photos of D. indica with its' petals still intact. The photos are not in a high resolution as the photos of these flowers are cropped and the flowers were high up in the tree. A freshly fallen petal captured under the tree. It has a faint smell of jasmine.

Close up for D. excelsa

That's the close up for D. excelsa (left). Notice that this species is easy to identify based on the purple contrast of stamens and carpels compared to the golden yellowish petals. There are seven carpels in this flower and there are two distinct groups of stamens (below), the inner group longer which curved slightly inside while the outer group stamens are shorter. The below of the outer stamens are yellowish in colour. Note that the pollen are yellowish at the tips. The carpels are cylindrical in shape (below).

Blooming week for Dillenia!

Hooray! After the long waiting, i got the opportunity to witness the full bloom of D. indica (photo below) and D. excelsa (photo left and below) in FRIM last week. I was very excited to see this. The flower of D. excelsa that are claimed to be fragrant is indeed true when you actually smell the stamen. The petals are odourless. However, i got a small surprise when i took a freshly petal of D. indica that fell down to smell as i was photographing under the tree. Although it was predicted to be odourless, it surprised me with as the white petal gave me a faint smell like jasmine. However, there's only one regret that i didn't bring along my tripod last week to capture the bloomings. As the tree are high, not much can be done about it as we know the petals of Dillenia will fall off in a day. Therefore, the petals won't look fresh even when being photograph at noon. Morning is the best timing to take photographs of it but surely there will be the lighting problem. I'm still learning to improve my photo capturing skills.

Dillenia pulchella

Previously on my trip in search of Dillenia albiflos, i had taken this opportunity to go hunting for Dillenia pulchella likewise. On the left is the photo of D. pulchella, the tree is almost leafless. It is far to high for me to get a sample and the habit in the swampy area causing more difficulties exploring the jungle. Therefore, i just managed to collect a few dried leaves for my anatomical studies. The results weren't that good either. The leaves of this species has entire margin compared to the rest of other species in Peninsular Malaysia that has toothed and serrate margin. The leaves' reticulation are clear on both sides. I'm longing to see this species again to get a baucher of it if possible as my searched for it at KL Lake Garden (Taman Tasik Titiwangsa) failed to give me a result although being recorded a few times.

Pollen of Dillenia reticulata King

Things had been tough recently as it's time for all the analysis part dealing with my morphological study on the herbarium speciments. I'm still stumbling on it. At the same time, i'm involving myself with my study of Dillenias' pollen under SEM (Scanning Electron Microscope). The waiting during the process is really a hectic one. Till now, i only had 4 samples of the pollen. I got an interesting result last Saturday regarding my pollen structure of D. indica. It consists of both porus (Monoporate) and colpus (Tricolpate) aperture forms. This give me a hint that i might be able to build a key out of my SEM study on pollen. However, i'm still not certain on that but it will surely be an additional information made available. Below is the pollen of D. reticulata King under SEM that shows the polar view indicating tricolpate; 3 aperture in the colpus form. The flower without the petals are taken from my last trip to Panti, Johor (photo below). I'm in the waiting for transportation right now to go to Kedah to search for my species of D. obovata that is restricted in the northern of Peninsular Malaysia. Hopefully i'll manage to settle everything by mid May to enable me to settle my thesis early.