Sapria himalayana is a rare holoparasitic flowering plant related to Rafflesia

Rafflesia

Rafflesia is a genus of parasitic flowering plants. It contains approximately 28 species , all found in southeastern Asia, on the Malay Peninsula, Borneo, Sumatra, Thailand and the Philippines.Rafflesia was found in the Indonesian rain forest by an Indonesian guide working for Dr...

found in the Eastern Himalaya

Eastern Himalaya

Eastern Himalaya is situated between Central Nepal in the west to Myanmar in the east, occupying southeast Tibet in China, Sikkim, North Bengal, Bhutan and North-East India. The area has been declared a biodiversity hotspot by Conservation International....

s. Sapria himalayana represents the extreme manifestation of the parasitic mode

Parasitism

Parasitism is a type of symbiotic relationship between organisms of different species where one organism, the parasite, benefits at the expense of the other, the host. Traditionally parasite referred to organisms with lifestages that needed more than one host . These are now called macroparasites...

, being completely dependent on its host plant for water, nutrients and products of photosynthesis

Photosynthesis

Photosynthesis is a chemical process that converts carbon dioxide into organic compounds, especially sugars, using the energy from sunlight. Photosynthesis occurs in plants, algae, and many species of bacteria, but not in archaea. Photosynthetic organisms are called photoautotrophs, since they can...

 which it sucks through a specialised root system called haustoria. These haustoria are attached to both the xylem

Xylem

Xylem is one of the two types of transport tissue in vascular plants. . The word xylem is derived from the Classical Greek word ξυλον , meaning "wood"; the best-known xylem tissue is wood, though it is found throughout the plant...

 and the phloem

Phloem

In vascular plants, phloem is the living tissue that carries organic nutrients , in particular, glucose, a sugar, to all parts of the plant where needed. In trees, the phloem is the innermost layer of the bark, hence the name, derived from the Greek word "bark"...

 of the host plant.

Geographical distribution

It has been recorded in Namdapha National Park

Namdapha National Park

Namdapha National Park is the largest protected area in the Eastern Himalaya biodiversity hotspot and is located in Arunachal Pradesh in Northeast India. It is also the largest national park in India in terms of area. It is located in the Eastern Himalayan sub-region and is recognized as one of the...

 in Northeast India. There are historical records of the species from other areas in Northeast India such as Mishmi Hills Aka Hills in Arunachal Pradesh, and in Assam

Assam

Assam , also, rarely, Assam Valley and formerly the Assam Province , is a northeastern state of India and is one of the most culturally and geographically distinct regions of the country...

, Manipur

Manipur

Manipur is a state in northeastern India, with the city of Imphal as its capital. Manipur is bounded by the Indian states of Nagaland to the north, Mizoram to the south and Assam to the west; it also borders Burma to the east. It covers an area of...

 and Meghalaya

Meghalaya

Meghalaya is a state in north-eastern India. The word "Meghalaya" literally means the Abode of Clouds in Sanskrit and other Indic languages. Meghalaya is a hilly strip in the eastern part of the country about 300 km long and 100 km wide, with a total area of about 8,700 sq mi . The...

, but there have been no recent records of the species from these areas. In Thailand it is found in Doi Suthep National Park, Doi Inthanon

Doi Inthanon

Doi Inthanon ) is the highest mountain in Thailand. It is located in Mae Chaem District. The mountain was also known in the past as Doi Luang or Doi Ang Ka, meaning the crow's pond top. Near the mountain's base was a pond where many crows gathered...

 , Doi Phu Kha National Park

Doi Phu Kha National Park

Doi Phu Kha National Park covers a part of 8 districts in Nan Province, northern Thailand and has rich natural resources. It is the origin of several rivers such as Nan River, Pua River, Wa River....

 and Kaeng Krachan National Park

Kaeng Krachan National Park

Kaeng Krachan is the largest national park of Thailand, located at the northern end of the Malay Peninsula. Due to its location near the tourist town of Hua Hin it is a popular park.-Geography:...

. It is also found in Myanmar

Myanmar

Burma , officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar , is a country in Southeast Asia. Burma is bordered by China on the northeast, Laos on the east, Thailand on the southeast, Bangladesh on the west, India on the northwest, the Bay of Bengal to the southwest, and the Andaman Sea on the south....

 and Vietnam

Vietnam

Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...

. It is found in evergreen forest

Evergreen forest

An temperate evergreen forest is a forest consisting entirely or mainly of evergreen trees that retain green foliage all year round. Such forests exist in the tropics primarily as broadleaf evergreens, and in temperate and boreal latitudes primarily as coniferous evergreens.-Tropical evergreen...

s at altitudes between 800 and 1,450 metres.

Description

The visible body is globose. The flowers are about 20 cm across, dioecious

Dioecious

Dioecy is the property of a group of biological organisms that have males and females, but not members that have organs of both sexes at the same time. I.e., those whose individual members can usually produce only one type of gamete; each individual organism is thus distinctly female or male...

 and unisexual. They have 10 bract

Bract

In botany, a bract is a modified or specialized leaf, especially one associated with a reproductive structure such as a flower, inflorescence axis, or cone scale. Bracts are often different from foliage leaves. They may be smaller, larger, or of a different color, shape, or texture...

s and are bright red in colour covered with sulphur-yellow spots. They appear above the ground, bloom for 2–3 days and have a putrid odour. Flowers are fleshy with imbricate inflorescence

Inflorescence

An inflorescence is a group or cluster of flowers arranged on a stem that is composed of a main branch or a complicated arrangement of branches. Strictly, it is the part of the shoot of seed plants where flowers are formed and which is accordingly modified...

. Perianth is campanulate. Male flowers have 2-loculed anthers, broadly ellipsoid, dehiscent

Dehiscence (botany)

Dehiscence is the opening, at maturity, in a pre-defined way, of a plant structure, such as a fruit, anther, or sporangium, to release its contents. Sometimes this involves the complete detachment of a part. Structures that open in this way are said to be dehiscent...

 by apical pores; apical cupular body base convex; gynostegium blood red. The female flowers have a concave cupular body base with sterile stamens. Gynostegium stouter than stamens. Flowering is between August and September followed by fruiting during winter. After blooming, the flower dehisces and becomes dark in colour and subsequently decomposes slowly. Fruits are swollen and crowned with perianth. The seeds are of the size of a grape fruit and are blackish-brown in colour.

Sapria is a root parasite and its usual hosts are liana

Liana

A liana is any of various long-stemmed, woody vines that are rooted in the soil at ground level and use trees, as well as other means of vertical support, to climb up to the canopy to get access to well-lit areas of the forest. Lianas are especially characteristic of tropical moist deciduous...

s such as Vitis

Vitis

Vitis is a genus of about 60 species of vining plants in the flowering plant family Vitaceae. The genus is made up of species predominantly from the Northern hemisphere. It is economically important as the source of grapes, both for direct consumption of the fruit and for fermentation to produce...

and Tetrastigma

Tetrastigma

Tetrastigma is a genus of plants in the grape family, Vitaceae. The plants are vines that climb with tendrils and have palmately compound leaves. The species are found in subtropical and tropical regions of Asia, Malesia, and Australia, where they grow in primary rainforest, gallery forest and...

. The flowering shoot is short, erect and unbranched. It has been suggested that flies pollinate it while seed dispersal may be by rodents, but this has not been confirmed by direct observation.