Yunnan's 'lonely' orchid king is self-taught expert

Road to botany

Born in Daxichang village in Yunnan's Malipo county, Guo began growing corn on the family plot on the steep karst slopes in the area after graduating from middle school.

"As we were forced to plant in the cracks between rocks, our corn yields were very low," Guo said. "We were quite poor."

To support his family, he began to trade wild orchids and planted Lanxangia tsao-ko, a member of the ginger family, and found jobs as a migrant worker.

His life changed in 2002 when he met a botanist who had come to survey wild orchids in Malipo, which lies on the border with Vietnam and is known for its biodiversity, especially its plants. The researcher, who came from the Orchid Conservation & Research Center of Shenzhen in Guangdong province, hired Guo as his guide.

Thanks to a passion for exploring the wilderness he has had since he was a child, Guo knows the area's karst mountains and forests very well. He was able to help the researcher complete the survey successfully, and in March 2003, he was hired by the center as a temporary orchid surveyor.

In addition to covering his costs, the center paid him 1,500 yuan ($218) a month, and their temporary working relationship lasted until 2017.

As more botanists came to Malipo, Guo began to realize that his home was a treasure trove of wild plants and that growing Dendrobium orchids, treasured herbs in traditional Chinese medicine, might help him finally shake off poverty.

He learned from the researchers he guided and bought books, teaching himself photography and learning how to use the internet from his children just so he could "know a little more".

As Guo's knowledge of the kingdom of botany deepened, he gradually became known in the area as a "soil expert", not only for growing Dendrobium, but also for nurturing other orchid species and for his ability to find wild plants.

"An expert specialized in the Laurel family asked me to help him find 20 different samples. He showed me photos and illustrations," Guo said, "Then I started searching for similar plants in the wild and gradually got to know the family. Later, a Melastome specialist sought my help, and I became familiar with another family of plants."

The experience accumulated over the course of numerous field trips has turned Guo into a walking map of wild plants. "There are around 6,000 species of flowering plants in Malipo, and more than 80 have been named after the county," he said. "This is more than in many other provinces, and that's why botanists have kept coming here."

Entomologists, zoologists and ecologists have followed the botanists. "While they are here, they turn my home into their workstation," he said.