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Every weekend, VU Sabu from Ambalavayal village in Wayanad district, Kerala, embarks on a journey to the Western Ghats, not for leisure but with a mission to safeguard wild orchids. Known for their beauty, wild orchids possess a pleasant aroma and hold significant value in medicine and horticulture.
Sabu's passion for these plants blossomed while completing higher studies in healthcare management. "I started reading up on wild orchids and realised that they play a crucial role in climate control and biodiversity maintenance. Their flowers are indicators of ecosystem health and they do not thrive in polluted air. I also found that the population of wild orchids in the hilly terrains of the Western Ghats has witnessed a decline in the past decades," said Sabu, who works as a senior manager in operations at Dr Moopen's Medical College Healthcare in Wayanad.
In 2016, he decided to pursue conservation as a hobby, venturing into the forest to collect and protect wild orchids. Despite lacking agricultural expertise, he initiated his own approach to collect, conserve and augment these plants.
His method involves collecting wild orchids from tree trunks, water streams, rocks and fissures, understanding their growth requirements, nurturing and propagating them at his home garden, and eventually replanting them near the mother plant without causing harm. He meticulously documents the plant's growth.
Sabu said that he has so far successfully replanted around 200 wild orchid varieties in the Western Ghats, including 16 endangered varieties such as Acampe rigida and Bulbophyllum careyanum that are part of the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). He has also planted 4,000 commercial orchid plants in three poly houses covering 750 square metres.
Protecting wild orchids is challenging as they grow in specific conditions that Sabu needed to recreate in his garden. "Almost 40 per cent of the wild orchids I have collected grow on trees and need protection from harsh sunlight and heavy rain. I mount them on a coconut tree that I call the 'crown tree'. The rest — collected near waterbodies or under rocks — are grown in pots," he said. Propagating these wild orchids in the garden take eight months to two years. “Once I replant these orchids in the wild, I monitor their growth in the wild for at least six months to ensure they are healthy,” he said, adding that there is a 90 per cent survival rate of the restored orchids.
Talking about the importance of the initiative, Safia Ibrahim, head programme coordinator, Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Wayanad, said Sabu is regularly invited to train farmers who practice floriculture in the district. "Wayanad is a tourism district, so we promote floriculture. He is our go-to person for any information on orchids," said Ibrahim.
"Over time, I have developed a map of wild orchids in the Western Ghats, along with a database of that I share with agricultural institutes and researchers," he said. Sabu's home has become a haven for over 5,000 research students and botanists from over 20 institutions, eager to study wild orchids.