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Orchid, Gurukula, India, 2002

Alt tag: Photo: Close-up of a pink orchid

A pink orchid blooms in the dense rain forests of India's Western Ghats mountain range. Once linked by land, the Western Ghats and the island nation of Sri Lanka together make up a biodiversity hotspot—a place with threatened natural habitats that are rich in species, especially plants, that live nowhere else.

(Text adapted from and photo shot on assignment for, but not published in, "India's Western Ghats," January 2002, National Geographic magazine)

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Photograph by Frans Lanting