Regions: Himalaya & the hills

A thorny yellow-wooded Himalayan shrub with blue berries and traditional root use.

The chuli of Ladakh and Kinnaur — blossom in April, fruit and kernel oil by July.

Pink blossom in November, out of season by every other measure — the hill wild cherry.

A Himalayan cherry with long fruit racemes that thrushes and bulbuls strip in weeks.

The tejpatta of the sub-Himalayan tract — three-veined leaves, straight off the tree.

The plane tree of Kashmir, planted for four centuries and unmistakable in autumn.

Long soft needles in fives; the pine of the mid-Himalayan slopes.

The resin pine of the lower Himalaya, and the needle litter that makes those fires.

A tall hill-forest tree with pinnate leaves and scented pink-tinged timber.

Sesame-like seeds used across the eastern Himalaya in chutney and oil.