The zoological garden in Guwahati is famous for housing 107 species of animals, including the highly endangered one-horned rhinos and Royal Bengal tigers, but few know it is also home to an astounding array of plant life.

As many as 607 species of plant are found in the zoo of which more than half are indigenous, making it a one-stop destination for plant lovers.

Not just plant enthusiasts, the zoo is also visited by people as diverse as ayurvedic practitioners looking for medicinal varieties, devotees in search of 'darbha' grass for rituals and nursery owners keen on acquiring saplings of exotic trees.

And thanks to the rich flora of the forest, all these demands have been met, says zoo director Narayan Mahanta.

The visitor's list does not, however, include another category -- hordes of botany students who invade the campus to pluck specimens for course study.

Mahanta recalls the painstaking work put in by a staffer of the botany wing of the zoo, Nagen Das, to document the rich plant variety.

The vegetation found here, Mahanta says, is of a mixed kind - a combination of deciduous and evergreeen strains which can be described as a moist deciduous type with semi-evergreen patches. .

Among the hundred-odd plant species found here, the most common is the Makrisal and Mietenga which with their rough fluted bark and many branches serve as good microhabitats for lizards, especially geckos.

The Mietenga variety also produces bunches of sour fruit from which it gets its local name.

Mahanta says an intersting fact observed is the sporadic flowering of a few clumps of small purplish flowers which are ready sources of nectar and pollen with at least 14 species of insects found on them.

As a visitor looks up at the trees, he is struck by the variety of epiphytes that grow on the trunks. The most eye- catching one is the 'Drynaria quercifolia' and 'Asplenium nidus', the superb microhabitats for reptiles, especially arboreal snakes, he says.

Apart from the indigenously-grown species, there is an additional 275 imported varieties which became naturalised over time.