I am reading this book called "Rheophytes of the World" by C.G.G.J. Van Steenis. It is such a fascinating book. I really like the author's writing style. These older writers write like they're talking to you.

Check this out on page 7 when he tells of the difficulty in identifying rheophytes because herbarium collection descriptions are vague.

"Field notes should contain all information which can be observed on the spot, that is: precise locality and habitat, frequency, and altitude, and furthermore a record of the life structure of flower, fruit and seed that will be obscured or lost in the drying process (scent, fleshyness, etc.). Many labels fall short of this information. Not long ago (1977) I made an urgent plea to collectors to improve their field data. The time is past that plant collecting consisted of two actions: grab and dry. What we need is scientific collecting, with full notes on structure, habit and habitat, enabling the taxonomist to make use of field data not otherwise available to him. I want to emphasize this strongly here."

Wow! This is writing at its best. Can you feel he is trying to educate his potential readers? Surely many collectors, botanists, students would read this book and they're be educated by him, though the topic of the book is not really "how to be a good collector"! Can feel how strongly he believes in this!

Name Changes

Plant names are changed for three basic reasons.

1. Nomenclatural (to conform with the rules of the Botanical Code)
A change results in a new correct name while the former name becomes known as a 'synonym' and should no longer be used.

2. Taxonomic (as a result of a revised view of plant relationships)
"Taxonomy is the study of the principles and procedures of classification. A plant taxonomist reconsidering the classification of a particular group of plants has certain aims: to clearly delimit the taxa; to discern natural relationships; to produce a practical classification; and to ensure that plant names are correctly applied in relation to the type specimens." (Oh, so this is what Berg's been doing! :))

3. to correct a misidentification or misapplied name
"Plant identification is the act of determining the name of a plant (botanists actually refer to the is formal process as 'determination').
Misidentification-the act of giving an incorrect name to a plant.
Misapplication- the perpetuation of names resulting from an original misidentification. The name did not change, but the application of the name has.

From source of previous post. :)

infraspecific

"Infra" means "below" so when we talk about subspecies, varieties and forms, we are talking about infraspecific ranks.

Principles of the Botanical Code

(Spencer, R., Cross, R. & Lumley, P. 2007. plant names - A guide to botanical nomenclature.  Third edition. Melbourne: Csiro Publishing)

Principle 1: plant nomenclature, animal nomenclature and bacteriological nomenclature are independent.

Principle 2: the names of plants or plant groups are based on TYPES which, with rare exceptions, are actual dried specimens of plants.

Principle 3: nomenclature is based on priority of publication. This principle stresses the overriding importance of the first published name and, together with Principle 4, provides a means of determining which of several published names for the same plant is correct.

Principle 4: each plant or group of plants within a particular system of classification can bear only one correct name: the earliest one following the rules.

Principle 5: scientific names are to be treated as Latin.

Principle 6: rules of the Botanical Code are retrospective.

What I learn from ST 2137

What is Data?

"Data" is defined as

-things known (the attributes of Ficus species worldwide)

-assumed facts or figures

for which conclusions can be inferred. (which attributes are related to invasiveness, threatenedness)

What are the uses of data?

-To draw conclusions and make decisions (So which species are potential invasives and which species might we potentially lose forever? So we know which not to be cultivated and which to protect)

-To confirm statements (Is it true that smaller fig size mean more animals can eat and more well dispersed thus more weedy?)

-To make predictions on events to come (This species might go weedy, this might be threatened)

What is data analysis?

-The art of examining, summarizing, and drawing conclusions from data

-Transforming the data into knowledge.

Questions (hypothesis)-->Collecting data (which I don't do physically, unlike my other Honours friends)-->Analyzing data-->Answers/More questions/Any patterns/relationships (we all must do this and write it in our thesis)--> either conclude or collect more data

So technically all research students who work with data collection are doing data analysis.

Also Prof. Chan Yiu Man mentioned "we must get evidence to support what we believe in". This is my weakness. I must believe in Science. I must trust that the data and analysis method I use and produce evidence that creates knowledge and I must be able to stand by my work.

I work hard and I believe in what I do.

Fascination with Ficus

Sometimes I get a little disappointed. I am not still not good at doing research. I still don't quite get it. I might feel a little inferior to others actually.

But let me not do research to prove to others I can do it, rather, let me do it out of love, a passion for knowledge, to know and be known.

Sitting down here, looking at papers and websites, can get dry at times. I'm not very explorative (what an irony right?) but just now I was exploring Fig Web and I found faces, faces of Ficus lovers, Ficus researchers. Check out George Wieblen. He looks very extroverted and a fun person. And I see the smiles on their faces, the many many publications they have come up with... It's crazy, I mean they really love Figs, to do all these things. And they're people like my Professor, like my lab mates and possible people like me. 

Let this passion drive me to do work, not obligation.

I feel like I'm living in a world of Science.

taxonomic revisions

I am slightly stunned. 

I am reading a paper by C. C. Berg called "Proposals for treating four species complexes in Ficus Subgenus Urostigma Section Americanae (Moraceae)" [Blumea 52:295-312].

The problem with the Neotropical taxa of Ficus is that "The species complexes in Urostigma section Americana comprise a number of partly allopatric entities ('forms') that are morphologically so close that recognition is often very difficult or sometimes even impossible. Moreover, the pollinators of entities within within the complexes can be different, possibly implying genetic isolation" [Experientia 45:605-611].

Hmmm... I think basically what it means is that it is hard to classify these species because they are similar, yet different. So should we treat them as distinct species, or should we see them in a broader sense, as complexes or a common species/subspecies.

What Berg did was to propose a treatment for the four species complexes (F. americana, F. aurea, F. citrifolia & F. pertusa).

What stunned me was that many of the species known to be threatened are now being grouped together with others under one name. What that possibly could mean is that I might have less threatened species than previously thought...

It took me a long time to get used to this shifting and moulding, this plasticity of taxonomic groups. How one day, this species is here, another day, it's there when someone realizes it's been identified or evaluated wrongly. It's so flexible and changing. There are rules, but with new discoveries and knowledge, species are shifted around and sometimes ceased to exist when I suppose identified wrongly.

I feel very raw and new to this. A actually you probably can tell from the way I tried to explain what I know. I still can't grasp it proficiently at the moment. But I am in awed at the complexity and have started loosening up.

I used to think these things were fixed and do not change. But they do, they do!

*sigh*

It's true isn't it. The more you find out, the more you realize you have not found not. The more you know, the less you really know. 

The more you try to dig deeper, the bigger the mess you realize it really is.

But... There should come a point when it all makes sense, despite the mess.

I can't wait to arrive there.

I think too because Man gives plants their name and their classification, these things changes and there's not clear cut answer to a classification scheme.

Prof. Tan told me today that a data-miner must be resourceful. I must be about to plough through all the information and find what I need...

I hope to have a good reference section that I can be proud of. Being a perfectionist, if that can be something I am proud of, it must be very good.

Okay!

I really pray I can get my act together and do my best for this project.

I want to be a good data-miner and a Ficus expert by the end of the project.

And every step of the way, I will get better.

Some Hands On

Biologists are known to get their hands dirty and all. And being an "arm chair" biologist, brings its fair share of mocking. I feel that a lot of the data miners, the Plant Systematics Lab denizens, are not well looked upon by the people in the other labs.

Just moments ago, I brought out my Flora Malesiana and my Fig book and my camera and went to have a look at Ficus glossularoides on the ridge (I forgot we have it in our native plant garden). I read the description, I looked at the plant to understand, and took some photos. (I am so blessed. A cute little black bird with a red cap and a red patch on its back was chirping happily away and picking on some red fruits near me. I took a photo of it, shall put it up here once I can.) 

Ficus grossularioides (White - leafed fig)

"This shrub is very common along secondary forest edges, in wooded undeveloped land and along disturbed hedges. It may grow to a small tree, up to 9m... distinguished by its characteristic white leaf undersides. This fig is also called Ficus alba in older references..."

"Figs usually below the leaves on previous season's growth, in pairs, sessile or with a peduncle up to 0.2cm long."

"Leaves spirally arranged; lamina elliptic to oblong to ovate or (when juvenile) (sub)palmately 3-5(-7)-lobed to -fid, 3-15 by 1.5-7.5 cm (when juvenile up to 35 by 30 cm)"

Dicaeum cruentatum (Scarlet-backed Flowerpecker)

"A tiny bird of the tree tops constantly on the move feeding on flower nectar, buds and small insects and fairly common where these occur but due to its very small size may be easily missed..."

In a way, I really like my project. I actually much prefer this kind of "field work". (Actually there's no field work involved, but I hope to on my own initiative, do my own. But I look forward to any herbarium kinda visit.) I like to identify, I like to appreciate the structure and take some photos. I actually don't quite like doing experiments, even the outdoor kind, like we did in Tioman. I don't like to repeat experiments, being a perfectionists, I cannot stand it that there are factors we cannot control (but that's life isn't it. We face that in life all the time), I prefer collecting and making lists. 

I only realized it now, but this project actually quite suits me. Plus the fact that it allows me the flexibility that I need, with my external commitments.

By the end of this project, I'm supposed to become a Ficus expert (wouldn't that be cool? Work hard if you want that, dear girl!). I will know the geography of the pan tropical region (excellent for Missions). 

I really need to work hard if I want that effect. So, this  really must be my priority. I don't know where this will lead me, but if it were to lead me anywhere at all, I must do a good job. 

Currently the list is getting longer. I've yet to get rid of the synonyms or find a way to do that. But hope to have a chat with Prof. soon and get that going. 

I took a long one month break to focus on this Special Semester module called LSM4263 Field Studies in Biodiversity. I was rushing to complete the oral presentation and report.

Now, I'm back to figging.

I have visited the Botanic Gardens library twice to check out their Floras. They have a wider collection than our lab.

I'm currently trying to complete my list. I'm searching for the 730-755 species of Ficus. Currently I have about 700. But it's an incomplete and imperfect list with probably quite some mistakes, so the numbers could be lower.

I'm also finding out the cultivation status. Could it be that cultivated figs are more prone to becoming weedy??

Soon, I would need to find these figs corresponding wasps.

It looks like things are picking up speed.

Ficus finds in Pulau Tioman

I was at Pulau Tioman doing this...

And guessed what I found?


I was very excited to see Ficus species, but due to inexperience, I wasn't able to access the leaves, so I couldn't pluck branches down for IDing. We saw this HUGE fig tree! I like it a lot. :)

And after reading about ramiflory, cauliflory/flagiflory on the Floras, to be able to see it for real for the first time on a live specimen gives an incredible feeling. Look! This ficus species is both cauliflorous and flagelliflorous/geocarpic.



If it's growing on the rock, it's lithophytic as well! :)

I've been truely blessed by these chance encounters with these fig species.

Hope I can make a trip to visit specimens at the Botanic Gardens soon!

How does Statistics come in?

From "A Primer of Ecological Statistics" by Nicholas J. Gotelli and Aaron M. Ellison.

"Using statistics to test hypotheses is only a small facet of the scientific method, but it consumes a disproportionate amount of our time and journal space. We use statistics to describe patterns in our data, and then we use statistical tests to decide whether the predictions of an hypothesis are supported or not. Establishing hypotheses, articulating their predictions, designing and executing valid experiments, and collecting, organizing, and summarizing the data all occur before we use statistical tests."

What is Data Mining?

I thought the Wikipedia's description is quite good:

Data mining is the process of sorting through large amounts of data and picking out relevant information. It is usually used by business intelligence organizations, and financial analysts, but is increasingly being used in the sciences to extract information from the enormous data sets generated by modern experimental and observational methods. It has been described as "the nontrivial extraction of implicit, previously unknown, and potentially useful information from data" and "the science of extracting useful information from large data sets or databases."

Some updates

It's been a while since I've updated this blog! In fact, it's been a month. I've been quite busy coping with events and activities and work, and lost the zeal and enthusiasm I first started out with.

But may I not forget the joy of learning even when it gets routine.

So far I have typed out the traits of maximum height, sexual system (diecious/monoecious), minimum and maximum altitude, maximum and minimum dry and fresh fig diameter and position of fig on the plant. I encountered some difficulties with the position of fig, as the treatment in Malesiana and African floras are different.

In Malesiana, it clearly states whether the fig is axillary, found under the leaves, exhibit ramiflory, cauliflory and/or geocarpy. However, in the African flora, they describe the feature without using the term. This leaves me to interprete the feature to be able to assign a term. Further more, I do not know whether being found below the leaves is equivalent to growing on previous growth season's axillary spaces...

I was talking to Prof. the other day when he pointed out how some figs are geocarpic (fig underground on stolons) hence would only be dispersed by mammals or reptiles, like turtles which are much slower than dispersers like birds or bats, hence geocarpic species might be slower to spread than species that fig on axillary buds along the branches.

The next traits I would be tackling are probably growth form and habitat, which I avoided out of sheer fear of the task ahead. Figs are so diverse. They grow in so many places and they have so many growth forms. I would need to find a way to classify it so that I can quantify it in my excel spreadsheet.

My progress might be slower than I wish, as I would be away for a field trip next week to Tioman Island off Peninsula Malaysia East Coast. It would probably be the rare chance I get to do field work, since my project is datamining and deskbound. :) I hope to visit the Herbarium at the Botanic Gardens soon too. Prof. has helped me asked for permission and I am looking forward to see for myself what are all these Ficus plants I've been reading about in these floras.

What is taxonomy?

I am reading this paper by Ungricht et al. (2005) and it points out the "importance of sound taxonomy... is a prerequisite in conservation evaluation in general." (page 221) There appears to be a trend whereby the estimates of endemicity would drop "after taxonomic revisions across major regions as those in the Flora Malesiana, encompassing several centres of endemism."

This sounds entirely logical, as there can only be two outcomes when one studies two sites of endemism. One is that he realizes many of the species that are studied by different individuals and are given different names are actually the same, the other, is that they're different. So the one doing the confirmation, I presume this is called taxonomic revision, would be the one who consolidates, compares and classifies. More likely than not, some species would be classified as the same species.

Is this why these revisional studies are so important? There has been revisional studies done for Asian, Australasian and African members of the Ficus genus but not yet any for the neotropical Ficus flora. Taxonomist like Vazquez Avila and Berg are currently working on the neotropical revisions (Berg 1989).

So what is taxonomy?

Genesis 2:19-20
Now the Lord God had formed out of the ground all the beasts of the field and all the birds of the air. He brought them to the man to see what he would name them; and whatever the man called each living creature, that was its name. So the man gave names to all the livestock, the birds of the air and all the beasts of the field.

1 Kings 4:33
He(Solomon) described plant life, from the cedar of Lebanon to the hyssop that grows out of walls. He also taught about animals and birds, reptiles and fish.

The naming and describing of life?

According to A Dictionary of Botany by George Usher (1966), taxonomy is " the science of classifying living things".

According to The Penguin Dictionary of Botany by Allen Lane (1984), taxonomy is "the study of the principles and practices of classification. The term taxonomy strictly applied to the study and description of variation in the natural world and the subsequent compilation of classifications...
In dealing with the flora of an area several phases can be recognized. The first phase is mainly concerned with identification and is sometimes referred to as exploratory or pioneer. Study of many tropical areas is still in this stage. Once material is better known and taxonomists have a good understanding of local and regional variation of the species it moves into the consolidation phase. These two phases are jointly described by some as 'alpha' taxonomy. Once cytological or biosystematic data are available these can be added to existing data. Taxonomy in which all available evidence is considered is described as the encyclopaedic phase or 'omega' taxonomy."

Ah, this is interesting right?

References

Berg, C.C. 1989. Classification and distribution of Ficus. Experientia 45:605-611

Ungricht, S., J. Rasplus and F. Kjellberg. 2005. Extinction threat evaluation of endemic fig trees of New Caledonia: priority assessment for taxonomy and conservation with herbarium collections. Biodiversity and Conservation 14: 205-232

Fig trees on St. John's Island

From the "Singapore's Heritage Tree Register". The ficus heritage species. Take a look at those found in St. John's island!

I believe I saw the one at Duxton Plain too. Very strong and mighty.



I saw these trees with the "Ficus superba" tags at St. John's Island during a camp. The trees at St. John's were very mature and beautiful. Really like the Tembusus that abound.

This is one of them.





I'm not sure what are these. They look like stranglers to me.

E. J. H. Corner

Mabberley, D. J. (1999) Edred John Henry Corner, C. B. E. 12 January 1906-14 September 1996. Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society

"Important in his later career was the interest that he took in figs (Ficus, Moraceae), of which he published preparatory accounts of some of the Malayan species in 1933 and 1939."

"At Cambridge, Corner built on his account of figs in Wayside trees, elaborating a classification of the genus Ficus, although his account of the Malesian species remains unpublished beacuse he fell out with the editors of Flora Malesiana. Some of his type specimens are deposited in the Cambridge University herbarium. In concentrating on so large a genus, he saw clearly, as he did in his seed work, the 'grades' of classification and the importance of clades that underpin modern phylogenetic work."

"In figs, his greatest alpha-taxonomic group, it was the development of the leaf venation that opened up new insights."

Rather than just quoting from the paper, perhaps it's better for me to interpret and analyze. As I looking through the Flora Malesiana for figs, keep coming across Corner's name, so decided to read his biography and I was captivated.

He is a man who devoted his life to furthering knowledge. The paper helped introduce me to the man behind the papers and books and names. Through the paper, you could see Corner as a son, student, as a botanist, Professor and conservationist.

Distribution of World's Ficus

http://www.britannica.com/ebc/art-26/Floral-kingdoms-subkingdoms-and-major-regions-of-the-world



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecozone


2: p4

"The genus is pantropical, extending to subtropical (or warm temperate) regions. It comprises c. 735 species, of which c. in America, c. 105 in Africa (continent, Madagascar and other Indian Ocean islands, and the Arabian Peninsula), and the others in the Asian-Australasian region; 367, including five introduced ones, occur in Malesia..."

How many in Asian-Australasian region then? 735 - 105 - 367 = 263

pantropical = occurring or distributed throughout the tropical regions of the Earth

Species Extinction and Invasive Species

Since my project is about what makes one ficus species invasive and what makes another at high risk of extinction, it would be good to first discuss what is invasiveness and what is extinction. :)

I am reading "Essentials of Ecology" by G. Tyler Miller, Jr. (2007) Fourth Edition. Thomson Learning. It is a good textbook for fun and casual, layperson reading. A lot of beautiful pictures and not very dense in content, straightforward and simple. In stark contrast to another textbook - Ecology, Concepts & Applications by Manuel C. Molles, Jr. that is very text dense.

Species Extinction

There are three types of extinction. Local extinction occurs when a species is no longer found in an area but is still found elsewhere in the world. Ecological extinction occurs when so few members of a species are left that the remaining members are no longer able to perform their ecological functions in their communities. Biological extinction occurs when a species is no longer found on planet earth. Biological extinction is permanent!

Besides being extinct, a species can also be endangered or threatened. An endangered species has so few individual survivors that it could soon become extinct; while a threatened species (aka vulnerable species) is still abundant in its natural range but is declining in numbers and could soon be endangered and/or extinct.

Certain characteristics predisposes a species to extinction. These characteristics could be innate, for example a low reproductive rate or dependent on external factors such as presence of predators and pollinators.

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) - also known as the World Conservation Union publishes annual Red Lists, which is a list of the world's threatened species. This is where I go to to find my threatened ficus species.

"Scientists also use models to estimate the risk of a particular species becoming endangered or extinct within a certain period of time, based on factors such as trends in population size, changes in habitat availability, interactions with other species, and genetic factors."

Is this what I'm doing?

Invasive Species

There are two types of introduced species: deliberately introduced species and accidentally introduced species. Deliberately introduced species are nonnative species that are brought in to provide food, medicine and other benefits. For example, ficus species are very popular ornamental plants. They are thought not be spread, due to their need to specific wasps as pollinators. However, wasps can travel as well and many ornamental figs have become weeds. Accidentally introduced species are unwanted guests that come in many ways. Wild pets might escape peoples' homes. Cargo ships discharge their ballast water containing nonnatives. Earthworms hide among soil when vegetables are shipped. Our local infamous changeable lizards take the Malayan Railway from Thailand to Tanjong Pagar railway station.

There also is a distinction between alien species and invasive species. I believe only when an alien/nonnative species invades an ecosystem, then they are considered invasives.

Such invasive species are called weeds, though a weed is not necessarily invasive. I believe a weed is any unwanted plant. There is a quote that goes "a weed is but an unloved flower" but this is likely a romanticized statement. To ecologists and conservationist, a weed, if its invasive, is a ruthless invader that should be eliminated at all costs. For me, I get my ficus weed species from The Global Compendium of Weeds.

So here is a short introduction to this enormously large topic! :)

Habit of Figs

Growth form of ficus species:
Mechanically independent plants
a) trees
b) treelets
c) shrubs
Most forest-forms occur in this genus, except herbaceous (a herb is a non-woody, small plant) ones.

Mechanically dependent plants
a) climbers
b) hemi-epiphytes
"The seeds germinate on branch, trunk, or aerial root, in a crevice or hole, often brought there by ants. Because of the need of light for germination, seedlings are in general found at about 20-25m above the forest-floor." (2; p23)
- Are stranglers a subset of hemi-epiphytes? Those hemis that managed to kill their hosts?
c)hemi-epilithic (found on rock surface or man-made walls)

Epiphyte (air plant) - A plant that has no roots in the soil and lives above the ground surface, supported by another plant or object. It obtains its nutrients from the air, rain water, and from organic debris on its support.

Liana (liane) - A long-stemmed woody climbing plant that grows from ground level to the canopy of trees.
-Are lianas climbers?

I am trying to make sense of the growth-forms of the Ficus genus. Because it was so confusing reading "African fig trees and fig wasps" by C.C. Berg and J.T. Wiebes. This is especially so for the mechanically dependent plants (those that lean or climb on other plants). You hear things like climber, epiphytic, hemi-epiphytic, hemi-epilithic, secondarily terrestrial, lianescent, epilithic scrambler, terrestrial etc., so what are the definitions for these various growth forms? Are there overlaps?

How should I categorise them in my dataset?

Do those categories I have come up with sufficiently cover all life forms in the genus?

Flora Malesiana's treatment of Ficus

Flora Malesiana. Series I, Volume 17/Part 2 (2005) iv + 1-730, by C. C. Berg & E. J. H. Corner

"Contains the taxonomic treatment of Ficus (Moraceae) for Malesia, i.e., the area covering the countries Indonesia, Malaysia, Brunei Darussalam, Singapore, the Philippines, and Papua New Guinea."

"A pantropical genus of terrestrial and hemi-epiphytic trees and shrubs or climbers with a unique inflorescence (syconium, fig). This forms the basis of a unique and complex pollination system requiring flowering phenologies that make mature inflorescences highly important as food source for forest animals. Large-scale economic value is confined to production of indoor and outdoor ornamental trees.

The genus, the largest of the 37 genera of the family, comprises about 735 species worldwide and 367 currently recognised in the Malesian region."

The genus is subdivided into six subgenera:

-Ficus

-Pharmacosycea

-Sycidium

-Sycomorus

-Synoecia

-Urostigma

And look what I found in the foreword!

"Are all botanists crazy? I began to think that anyone who would bother with such a genus as Eurgenia must be a bit off; to say nothing of those who like to play with Ficus." (from a letter of Merrill to Lam, 23 August 1949)

Photo copyright Henriette Kress, http://www.henriettesherbal.com/ (Eugenia uniflora)

Photo copyright Antonie van Den Bos, http://www.aycronto.com/ (Ficus carica)

How to identify a fig-tree?

A guide to the fabulous FIGS of Singapore published by the Singapore Science Centre (2005) by Ng, A et al.. is an excellent layperson introduction to the figs of Singapore. It is very user-friendly and enjoyable to read, even the preface is good. There is a lot of interesting snippets in it, like how the "Banyan Tree" got its name. The English who saw Indian traders and merchants called "banyans" in Hindi, trading under the Ficus benghalensis, associated the huge fig trees with the "banyans," hence the tree got it's name!

The illustrations are beautiful, so are the pictures.

One significant thing I learnt from this book is how to identify a fig tree.

Members from the Moraceae family have
(1) Stipules (i.e., bud-coverings) covering the new buds at ends of twigs
(2) Scar rings on twigs (formed from fallen stipules)
(3) Sap (i.e., white or yellow latex)

What is a fig-tree?

From "Wayside Trees of Malaya" by E. J. H. Corner (1988) 3rd Edition. Kuala Lumpur: United Selangor Press

FIG-TREES

FICUS (Lat., a fig-tree)

Trees with latex: bark generally smooth and entire; twigs marked with a ring-like scar at each node, from the falling off of the conical stipule covering the bud; twigs of small trees often hollow.

Leaves simple or lobed, arranged spirally, alternate or opposite, commonly rather unequal-sided.

Flowers tiny, set inside the fleshy figs, of three kinds: male flowers with 1-5 stamens; female flowers with an ovary and a long style, each setting one seed; gall-flowers like the female but swollen, balloon-like, with a short funnel-shaped style, each containing a fig-wasp, not setting seed; flowers with 3-5 tiny, often wine-red, sepals or merely a cup-shaped calyx.

Fruits as full-grown ripened figs.

About 1000 species, tropical and subtropical, about 500 species in Asia and Australasia; about 100 species in Malaya, lowland and mountain.

Why Ficeae?

Ficeae is the tribe which Ficus, the genus is in. Moraceae is the family.

I had wanted fig, figs, ficus, figwasp and moraceae as my blog address. The first four were already in use and I felt "Moraceae" was not specific enough since my project would be solely on figs. So I searched around till I found that Ficus was in the Ficeae tribe. It is the only genus in the tribe.

I am so excited about my project that I could not help but to make this.

Browsing through the literature on Ficus, I was overwhelmed by the quantity of research done. It either means my job will be easier or my job will be tougher. I hope to see it both ways, so I will not slacken, neither will I be complacent.

Once again, I want to thank my Professor, Prof. Hugh Tan for this opportunity to do this research! It is a chance to search or investigate a topic exhaustively which entices and excites me.

I'm eager to embark on this journey!

Like what Wee Foong said, may it last me all the way through.

May God guide me in all things with all wisdom and love.