On a bare rock, lichens are the pioneers, slowly breaking it down to form soil. In a pond, the pioneers are usually small, floating plants like phytoplankton. But in our Telangana ponds, the so-called 'pioneer' now is often the water hyacinth, an invasive species that smothers the water body entirely, disrupting the natural succession.
I see it every day driving past the Husain Sagar lake—what should be a clear water succession has become a choking green mat, thanks to this outsider. The textbook answer feels distant when the reality is an invasion that leaves no chance for the true pioneers.
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