Goals: biodiversity

Reetha — the washing fruit of the sub-Himalayan tract, from a good shade tree.

A thorny southern climber whose pods have washed hair for centuries.

Khus — a grass whose roots hold a slope together and scent a summer room.

The dry-country bamboo of central India, solid-stemmed and drought-hardy.

Red February cups feeding every bird in the neighbourhood at once.

A sub-Himalayan tree giving edible fat and enormous quantities of nectar.

A cold-desert shrub of Ladakh, nitrogen-fixing and vitamin-dense.

Buransh — scarlet trusses across the mid-Himalaya in March.

The Himalayan cedar — a slow, magnificent, cold-climate conifer.

Sacred, enormous and the most valuable bird tree in any Indian city.