A 90-year-old visitor sits on a giant water lily leaf at Botanic Garden
All 16 ponds at the garden currently have Victoria amazonica. In 1950, botanist Robert Scott brought 50 saplings from the Amazon forest to Botanic Garden for research and conservation. The plants, however, had almost disappeared in 2020 after Cyclone Amphan devastated the garden and killed all the giant water lilies. “Yogi Vemana University in Kadapa, Andhra Pradesh, had received two plants from us in 2019. They gave us some seeds in Oct 2021. I discovered that two or three seeds had sprouted While changing the water in Feb 2022.
R Sarvanan, a botanist at the garden who came up with the idea, said the experiment was approved by director Kanad Das and additional director and garden-in-charge Manas Bhaumik. That is how the giant water lily returned to the garden,” Sarvanan said. Staff have gradually allowed heavier visitors to gently board the leaf and sit on the acrylic board, which is placed to prevent damage to the leaf. Eleven adapted, survived and later propagated. The authorities then contacted institutions to which it had donated giant lilies over the years. We tried to get them to sprout in soil, sand, tissue and cotton, but failed. Disheartened, I put them in a bottle of water and kept it in an almirah. The water had to be changed regularly. Overwhelmed by the success, Sarvanan first asked his son to sit on a lily leaf. After the leaf endured the child’s weight, he tried it with the children of other garden staff and found that three children could sit on a leaf at once. That sparked the idea of offering the same experience to visitors, leading to the ongoing experiment.