Tourism
The flowers that make the mountains blue
Sibashish Dash
The Neelgiri hills or the Blue Mountains get their name from the blue Kurinji flowers that cover the entire landscape once every 12 years. The flowers are purple-blue- showering the valley with the sublime purple haze when they bloom.
Maharashtra: BJP MLA violates Lockdown, distributes ration to people to celebrate his Birthday
Kurinji is a shrub that is also called neelakurinji. Found along the Western Ghats in the Shola forests in South India. They were documented first in 1858 and since then, they have bloomed only for 15 times. Scientists and botanists have failed to arrive at any conclusion that how these flowers manage to adhere to their blooming periods, which range from 3, 7, 12, 17 to even 36 years! The Paliyan tribal people living in Tamil Nadu used it as a reference to calculate their age.
The flowers are pollinated by honey bees. The honey collected by these bees is very sweet, nutritious and has high medicinal value. The taste is unique and so far, it hasn’t been artificially cultivated at all. Besides, the honey is only available when the flowers bloom once in 12 years. For now, you need to wait until 2030 to get some.
