Teak Trees Attracted Kakanava Crows to Buddhist Monuments at Sanchi

Summary: Teak trees with foraging, nesting, roosting accommodations attracted Kakanava crows to Buddhist monuments at Sanchi Hill in Madhya Pradesh, central India.

teak tree (Tectona grandis); Kolkata, West Bengal, India; Saturday, June 23, 2007: J.M. Garg, CC BY SA 3.0 Unported, via Wikimedia Commons

Teak trees with foraging, nesting, roosting accommodations attracted Kakanava crows and koels to namesake areas around subsequent Buddhist monuments at Sanchi Hill in central Raisen District, central Madhya Pradesh state, central India.

Teak forests throughout Madhya Pradesh (from Sanskrit मध्य, “middle” and प्रदेश, “region”) brought Asian koels, Indian house crows and Indian jungle crows to the Raisen District. Mauryan (from Sanskrit मोर, “peacock [clan emblem]”) Emperor Ashoka (from Sanskrit अशोक, “sorrow-free”) came to Raisen (royal residence, from Sanskrit राजन्, “king” and वासिनी, “abiding”) District. His first wife, Devi (from Sanskrit देवी, "goddess), devout Buddhist (from Sanskrit बुद्ध, "awakened") and district denizen, developed the sangha (from Sanskrit संघ, “multitude") community there.

Avian congregations, then contemplative communities elicited the name Kakanava (from Sanskrit काक, “crow” and नव, “caw-caw”), then Sanchi (from Sanskrit शान्ति, "calmness") for inhabited, teak-forested expanses.

Meher McArthur and J. Donald Ragsdale, in respective 2002- and 2007-released publications, figured teak trees in Gautama (from Sanskrit गौतम, “light[-dispelling] darkness”) Buddha’s birth (624 BCE?).

Teak trees grow asexually from hardwood and semi-hardwood cuttings and sexually from germinatable seeds in mildly acidic 6.1-6.5, neutral 6.6-7.5, mildly neutral 7.6-7.8 soil pH levels. Brown, spherical seeds, each with a 0.16- to 0.24-inch (0.4- to 0.6-centimeter) radius, herald brown seedlings in 10-plus days in calcium-rich, magnesium-rich, high-mineral, sunny, well-drained soils. No more than four seeds inhabit each drupe (stone fruit, from Latin drūpa, from Greek drūpa δρύππᾱ, “olive”) on teak trees fruiting yearly September through December.

Brown-yellow, globe-shaped, 0.39- to 5.91-inch (1- to 15-centimeter-) diameter fruits jutted from the branch ends of teak trees, for Kakanava crows near Buddhist monuments at Sanchi.

Pollinatable flowers every July through October kindle wildlife- and wind-dispersed fruits with shaggy, thick exteriors like matted hair and with spongy interiors every November through January.

The terminal buds of branch and stem shoots launch large inflorescences (from Latin inflōrēscentia, from inflōrēscere, “to begin to flower”) of predominantly white, sometimes pink-purple blooms. Their 7.88- to 35.433-inch (20- to 90-centimeter) panicles (from Latin pānicula, “threadlet,” from Greek πηνίον, “bobbin”) moor fine-haired, fragrant, 0.24- to 0.32-inch (6- to 8-millimeter) flowers. Nectaring, pollinating ants, bees, butterflies and flies navigate branches netting simple, smooth-margined 7.87- to 39.37-inch (20- to 100-centimeter) by 5.91- to 19.68-inch (15- to 50-centimeter) leaves.

Teak trees offered Buddhist monuments at Sanchi and Kakanava crows broad-based elliptical and oval, narrow-based obovate, feather-veined, hairy-undersided, tapering leaves as ground litter November through March.

The present Lamiaceae (from Latin lamium, “deadnettle” and -āceae, “-like”), previous Verbenaceae (from Latin verbena, “vervain”) family member presents brown heartwood, yellow sapwood and brown-gray bark.

The Indian, Myanmarese, Thai natives, qualified taxonomically by Carl Linnaeus the Younger (Jan. 20, 1741-Nov. 1, 1783), queues up through 3,3937-foot (1,200-meter) altitudes above sea level. The 65.62- to 164.04-foot- (20- to 50-meter-) high Tectona grandis (from Tamil thekku and Latin grandis, “big”) realizes 3.28- to 4.92-foot (1- to 1.5-meter) trunk diameters. Five-hundred-year life cycles survive mean annual 47.24- to 157.48-inch (1,200- to 4,000-millimeter) rainfall and temperatures of 71.6 to 82.4 degrees Fahrenheit (22 to 28 degrees Celsius).

Foraging, nesting, roosting tolerances and Buddha-birth and temple-wood traditions respectively tied Kakanava crows and Buddhist monuments at Sanchi to cliff-side and cliff-top populations of teak trees.

treed landscape of Temple 18 at Sanchi Hill's Buddhist stupa complex; development has destroyed much of the teak forest that originally surrounded Sanchi Hill and Sanchi town; Raisen District, Madhya Pradesh, central India; 1861 photograph of Sanchi Hill's ruined Temple 18 by Royal Bengal artillery officer and Survey of India photographer James Waterhouse (July 24, 1842-Sept. 28, 1922): The British Library Online Gallery, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

teak tree (Tectona grandis); Kolkata, West Bengal, India; Saturday, June 23, 2007: J.M. Garg, CC BY SA 3.0 Unported, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tree_in_new_leaves_(Tectona_grandis)_I_IMG_8133.jpg

treed landscape of Temple 18 at Sanchi Hill's Buddhist stupa complex; development has destroyed much of the teak forest that originally surrounded Sanchi Hill and Sanchi town; Raisen District, Madhya Pradesh, central India; 1861 photograph of Sanchi Hill's ruined Temple 18 by Royal Bengal artillery officer and Survey of India photographer James Waterhouse (July 24, 1842-Sept. 28, 1922): The British Library Online Gallery, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Temple_18_at_Sanchi_in_1861.jpg

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Marriner, Derdriu. 26 March 2021. "Indra’s Net Admits Buddhist Monuments at Sanchi and Maha Bodhi Society." Earth and Space News. Friday.
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Marriner, Derdriu. 29 January 2021. "Sanghamitra, Like Ashoka, Admired Buddhist Monuments at Sanchi Hill." Earth and Space News. Friday.
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