[shawnintland]

Hmmmm Robert! On the surface they look very similar but I think the mineral/metal content of the soils on Kinabalu where these species were growing were much higher than the 'normal' soils in My and Indo. There's a pretty simplified description in Wikipedia under 'ultramafic soils' that gave me a start but I need to read a lot more to claim any depth of understanding! They discuss plant species 'adapting' to grow in these metal-rich soils where other things can't. All made lots of sense...until I remembered that the plants growing epiphytically on trees and logs looked every bit as healthy as those in the ultramafic soils! So much for that theory!