TOP 10 DISCOVERIES
• A new snowdrop (Galanthus bursanus) from north west Turkey was discovered when a Turkish paediatrician uploaded her holiday photos to Facebook, where the plant was spotted by a Ukrainian snowdrop specialist.
• A new species of “miracleberry” (Synsepalum chimanimani) was discovered in the lowland rainforests of the Chimanimani Mountains on the Mozambique-zimbabwe border.
• A species from the family known as the “orchids of the falls” (Inversodicraea koukoutamba) was discovered on a waterfall on the Bafing River in Guinea, West Africa.
• A medicinal fungus known in China for more than 400 years, “Zhuhongjun”, has been discovered to be a genus as well as a species previously unknown to science, and has now been formally named Rubroshiraia bambusae.
• There were 10 new species of bear’s breeches plants found in tropical Africa.
• A striking bright pink, candystriped flower from the African violet family (Cyrtandra vittata) was discovered in New Guinea.
• There were 11 new species of trees and shrubs from the genus Freziera found in Andean forests in South America.
• A perennial herb (Costularia cadetii) which grows on the rims of the volcanoes in Reunion in the Indian Ocean.
• A vivid orange flower (Gladiolus mariae) was found growing on a table-stone mountain in Kounounkan, in Guinea.
• Zonozono, a 20m tall tree in the ylang-ylang family, has been discovered in Tanzania, but with just seven trees known on Earth.