2. Pinus yunnanensis Franch. var.pygmaea (Hsueh)

Hundred thousands hektares of Pinus yunnanensisFranch. var. pygmaea (Hsueh) distribute from the altitude 2850m to 3200m in the high mountains of Yan Kou and Wa Luo villages in Yan Bian county. Pinus yunnanensis Franch. var. pygmaea (Hsueh) is quite similar with Yunnan pine in shape, but its distributing area is much more limited than the latter, only in Yan Bian, Mi Yi, Mu Li and Zhao Jue counties of the northwestern Yunnan and sounthwestern Sichuan. On the b~sis of the existing surveys, the area of Pinus yunnan'~nsis Franch. var.pygmaea (Hsueh) in Yan Bian is the largest in Sichuan.Between the elevation of 2900m and about 3A,50m, they and the alpine oaks covered every corner of the mountain like a huge green carpet. If you watched them from distance, you must take them as an alpine meadow. Only when you get close enough, can you realize what they are with the height no more than one meter. On the top of the mountain with an altitude of 3300m, you would find continuous alpine bushes all around, it was really quite fantastic!

3. Cycas panzhihuaensis L.Zhou et S. Y. Yang

Cycas panzhihuaensis is listed as the national I-grade protected plant in China. According to the recordation,when it was the first time discovered in Pan Zhihua, people know that it is living in the valleys along the sides of Jinsha River in a few of places of Sichuan and Yunnan. But when the more specified survey of this plant was carried out in 2002, there were only hundreds of thousands of them in thePreserve of Cycas panzhihuaensis in Pan Zhihua, without any else left outside of the nature preserve!

Later, scientists found the reason why they got so rare.Having a ladylike ~ppearance, the Cycas panzhihuaensis is quite a good ornamental green plant for aesthetics. Some greedy merchants bought them from the local poor villagers at a little cost and then sQld them on the market for a very high price. It was a great pit~, fh~it~the local people were not aware of the importance and the value of this plant, they were tempted by the profits and cut down almost all the plants, even those had lived for many generations on the abrupt cliffs can not survive the bad damage. What a sadness!

The Preserve of Cycas panzhihuaensis in Pan Zhihua hold the International Cycas Conference in 1986. There are 230,000 plants of Cycas panzhihuaensis in merely 500 hektares' area in this reserve. During the end of April and the beginning of May, the rainning season has not come yet, the land of Pan Zhihua was in drought through the whole winter and the spring, you can only see a scorched scene everywhere except for the Cycas panzhihuaensis and some other few ligneous plants were in fresh greeness. It was the very season for them to blossom, the researchers picked off the pollen cone and put them on to the female cone to do the artificial pollination. The trigamous flowers looked like wearing a pretty crown.

Cycas panzhihuaensis is a tropical plant, so it hardly bloom in the northern cold areas, people in the north of China believed that this kind of plant would never have flower or would bloom only once in at least one thousand years. This thought may come out because of the chilly climate in the north, and the people seldom saw this plant blooming. It is quite rare for the Cycas to have flowers there, but it is pretty common in Pan Zhihua that the Cycas Sichuan tCllpine Ecoloov Studl,blossoms every year. Most of the Cycas in the preserve are aged from above 30 to 100 years, of course, some presious ones are even older than 1,000 years.

Before the establishment of this nature reserve, the local peasants usually cut the Cycas for feeding their pigs because the stems have rich amylum and very nutritious.There is no huge Cycas that has an age more than a thousand years any more near around the villages. Only some 2-3 meters tall plan~s are still alive on the cliffs of the back side of the mountain. After the reserve was set up, the locals never cut off the Cycas, because they were well educated by the reserve's workers and the rules for natural conservation were well executed by the local government.It's a good news that the local people won't ruin the Cycas and other rare plants but make their best efforts to protect them with great pride. So we believe this beautiful rare plant must have a very good prospect, and visitors going there will be happy with the situation.