Xishuang Banna Tropical Rainforest

Here you can see the apes and monkeys curveting between the trees, the wild elephants wandering along the forest path, tigers hiding in the woods and waiting for their prey, the python winding along freely…Xishuang Banna Tropical Rainforest is really a world full of wildness. 

Xishuang Banna is located on the border of southern China, in the mountainous area of southern Yunnan. It is China's largest and the most well-preserved tropical rainforest. The climate there is warm and humid all year round. Ample sunshine covers the mountains; the clear river flows along the winding valley; the dense forests appear very prosperous and mysterious.

In the forest, tall trees shade the sky. In order to get more sunlight, the trees compete severely against each other. In this way they become taller and taller. The huge wood has come out a kind of peculiar root called 'board root' so as to support its body and absorb nutrition. At the bottom part, the trunk stretches out several branches of roots which are in shape of triangle board. The 'board roots' is tens or dozens of centimeters thick. Their height could reach four to five meters, looking rather spectacular. Several plates of 'board roots' form a steady and firm foundation which supports the huge tree. This kind of tree is so huge that tens of persons hand in hand cannot circle it around. Look up and you can see the tree crown stretches straight to the sky. 

Not all plants can grow very tall. In order to grow tall, some of them choose a kind of cruel means, which is to kill other trees by strangling them. For some plants like banyan, when their seeds are eaten by birds or animals, the seeds will be excreted and dropped on the twigs. Relying on the nutrition from the excretion and the debris on the branches, these seeds begin to germinate and gradually grow up. The banyan tree can send up a number of clinging roots which appear like soft pipes. Those clinging roots absorb the water content in the air as they grow erectly towards the ground. In the forest, this kind of clinging roots is commonly seen. They stretch out from the high and huge tree crown in a floating way. Once the clinging root touches the ground, they will plunge into the earth and later grow into a strong and thick root. As the banyan grows up, all its clinging roots have tightly wrapped up the host tree which will eventually killed by this.

Some other plants are not ambitious like that. They just want to stand on the shoulder of the 'giants' so that they can some sunshine and water they need. Nearly every tall tree in the rainforest has various plants living on them. Seeing from under the tree, you will find some huge 'flower balls' and some delicate 'bird's nests'. Many of them are supercrescent ferns and they form many colorful 'gardens in the air'.   

The animals in the forest are far 'lower' than the plants. They are more likely to hide themselves, so you need more patience to find their traces. In Xishuang Banna Tropical Rainforest, over 500 species of land spine animals have already been discovered, which covers one quarter of the total amount of terricolous vertebrate that China has. The Indian elephant, gibbon, tiger, green peacock, small pandas, sloth monkeys…there are still many unknown animals living in accordance with the principle of the forest. 

 Tickets:
Entrance Fee: CNY 60 (kids under 1.2 m are free)
Sight-seeing Bus: CNY 20 per person
 Transportation: 
A. Take the long-distance bus traveling from Kunming Nanyao Long-Distance Bus Station to Mengla and get off at Menglun Town;
A. Take the Airline from Kunming to Jinghong, and transfer to the long-distance bus to Banna Botanical Garden.
 Best Time to Visit: Nov. to Apr.