Images of dry tropical habitat: Madagascar

Click on a thumbnail for a larger image. The thumbnails are arranged into 3 categories: Plants, Animals, and People and Landscapes. The number by each photo corresponds to its caption below .

Plants

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. click for more images.... potbellied palms, endemic Euphorbias, Alluaudia, Grewia, Combretum, Bignoniaceae, Malpighiaceae, more Erblichia, palms, grappling- hook fruit of Uncarina and baobabs!

1. Missouri Botanical Garden Student Sylvain Razafimandimbison with a large Pachypodium geayi, a bottle tree member of the Oleander Family (Apocynaceae) in the southwest.

2. Pachypodium brevicaule flowering in the central part of the island. Compare the habit of this species of Pachypodium with the one in the previous photo. They couldn't be more different: this one is a tiny tuber that barely reaches above ground level while the other is a massive tree!

3. Big Adansonia rubrostipa trees north of Tulear in the southwest.

4. Delonix decaryi (formerly known as D. adansonioides ), a bottle tree in the Legume Family (Fabaceae) that grows in the dry southwest.

5. The triangular palm Neodypsis decaryi is perhaps more abundant in cultivation than it is in habitat in the southeast.

6. Erblichia sp. (Turneraceae) blooming in the Ankarana dry forest in the north.

7 A Dutchman's Pipe (Aristolochia sp. in the Aristolochiaceae) in the Mikea Forest on the west coast of the island.

8. A species of Butterfly Tree or Orchid Tree in the genus Bauhinia sp. (Fabaceae) in the Mikea Forest on the west coast of the island.

9. Gloriosa sp., a member of the Lily Family (Liliaceae)in the Mikea Forest on the west coast of the island.

10. A wild species of the persimmon genus (Diospyros in the Ebenaceae) in the Mikea Forest on the west coast of the island.

Animals

1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. click for more images .... more chameleons, snakes, geckos, and millipedes!

1. The chameleon Furcifer pardalis from the north.

2. Female Furcifer labordi, a small chameleon from the dry southern west coast.

3. Chalarodon madagascariensis, an Iguana Family lizard common in some dry areas.

4. Acrantophis madagascariensis, a boa photographed in the north.

5. A terrestrial, dry forest-dwelling crab found 100 kilometers from the coast in northern Madagascar!

6. Big green millipede from northern dry forest.

7. Crab spider on the carnivorous pitcher plant Nepenthes madagascariensis in a seep in the dry southeast. Crab spiders often perch on flowers waiting to make meals of pollinating insects. This spider seems to be waiting to steal a meal from the pitcher plant.

8. Tenrec in hollow Alluaudia tree in southeast.

9. Giant terrestrial planarian from southeastern dry forest crawling on moist ground just after a rain.

10. Hissing cockroaches are common in dry forests throughout the island. This one was in the west and measured over 7 cm long.

People and landscapes

1. 2. 3.

1. Remanonzo, a local guide who helped me collect Moringa in southeastern Madagascar. He is shown here with one wife and their 10 children.

2. View of the capital, Antananarivo, from the Missouri Botanical Garden office there.

3. View of the Itremo region of central southern Madagascar. This area is characterized by dry quartz outcrops with many endemic plants and deep canyons that shelter relict fragments of once-larger forests. The person in the photo is A. Davis, a yodeling champion from Turkey.

 

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Instituto de Biología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
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C. P. 04510, México, D. F.
MÉXICO

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molson@ibiologia.unam.mx