The Fig and the Wasp

 When you tear a banyan fig open, chances are you will find a colony of tiny insects/ larvae inside it. But how did they get there?

Certain wasp species co-evolved with banyans. An impregnated female wasp carrying pollen enters the banyan fig, deposits pollen, lays her eggs and dies. When the eggs hatch, the male wasp impregnates a female wasp, drills out of the fig and dies. The female laden with fresh pollen, escapes through the hole drilled by the male, enters another banyan fig, deposits pollen, lays her eggs and dies. The cycle continues.

Since the life cycle of a wasp is very short, and they cannot reproduce without banyan figs, the banyan tree produces fruits throughout the year. These figs attract fructivorous birds like barbets and hornbills, ants, small mammals including monkeys and other flora/ fauna. The banyan tree is, therefore, always teeming with life.

The banyan is considered a keystone species since it, in effect, defines the ecosystem.

If you chop off the canopy of a banyan prior to translocation, you not only put the banyan in danger, you destroy the entire ecosystem that is centred around it.

On #NationalConservationDay, let us pledge to save the Banyan, our National Tree.