Community Structure and Plant Diversity of Community Based Religious
Conserved Forests of Garhwal Himalaya, India
Pala NA
1
, Negi AK
2
, Gokhale Y
3
, Shah S
4
and Kumar M
2
*
1
Department of Forestry, Faculty of Horticulture, Uttar Banga Krishi Vishwavidyalaya, Pundibari, Cooch Behar, West Bengal, India
2
Department of Forestry and Natural Resources, HNB Garhwal University Srinagar Garhwal, Uttarakhand, India
3
The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), New Delhi, India
4
Department of Forestry, College of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Fiji National University, P.O. Box 1544, Nausori, Republic of Fiji Islands
*
Corresponding author: Munesh Kumar, Department of Forestry and Natural Resources, HNB Garhwal University Srinagar Garhwal, Uttarakhand, India, Tel:
+91-9411789420; E-mail: muneshmzu@yahoo.com
Received date: January 13, 2016, Accepted date: January 28, 2016, Published date: February 01, 2016
Copyright: © 2016 Pala NA, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted
use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
The present study was carried out in four community based religious conserved forests areas i.e., Ansuiya Devi,
Ulkagari, Maroor and Jameshwar in Garhwal Himalaya. The aim of the study was to access the ecological and
diversity status. The selected sites have status either of reserve forest, communal forest/Van Panchyat or a
combination of these apart from having several temples of religious significance. Study was conducted following the
stratified random sampling technique by placing random quadrats of 10 m × 10 m size at forest floor. A total of 240
species of plants were recorded from the four study sites, which varied from 93 in Jameshwar to 119 in Ansuiya
Devi. The density of these forests ranged from lowest of 782 trees/ha in Jameshwar to 1352 trees/ha in Maroor. The
total basal cover (TBC) for trees showed a range of 31.67 m
2
/ha in Ulkagari to 84.34 m
2
/ha in Ansuiya Devi.
Distribution pattern of whole herb and shrub layers were found contagious whereas only three tree species were
found randomly distributed. Shannon diversity index (Hʹ) for tree species was recorded highest in Ansuiya Devi
(2.93) whereas; lowest value (2.10) was recorded in Maroor. Species richness (Margalef index) for trees ranged
from 3.29 to 4.35. The study is a pioneer in the aspect and can be helpful in making protocols and policy
implications to protect these sites by involving local communities in biodiversity conservation outside the protected
area network.
Keywords: Ecosystem; Conservation; Sacred; Protected; Himalaya;
Random sampling
Introduction
he urge for the protection of sacred natural sites have been
recognized by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and the
UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. he CBD in 2004
developed the Akwe Kon voluntary guidelines for the conduct of
cultural, environmental and social impact assessments regarding
proposed developments that may afect sacred sites and on lands and
waters traditionally occupied or used by indigenous and local
communities (Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity,
2004). Sacred natural sites are part of a broader set of cultural values
that diferent social groups, traditions, beliefs or value systems attach
to places and which ‘fulil humankinds need to understand, and
connect in meaningful ways, to the environment of its origin and to
nature [1]. here is still disagreement, however, as to what are the
best practices for forest conservation [2,3] with some advocating
strict protection and others arguing for alternative schemes such as
community-based, locally-implemented conservation. here are at
least three research findings that argue for the need to develop
alternatives to strict forest protection. First, empirical accounts indicate
significant social and economic costs for local populations derived
from the establishment of strictly protected forests [4,5]. Second,
recent research suggests that ater controlling for (statistically)
confounding variables, the efectiveness of strict forest protection in
reducing deforestation rates may not be as high as previously estimated
(i.e., a 10% reduction vs. earlier estimates of up to 65% reduction) [6]
hird, there is evidence that within the same region, forests managed
by local or indigenous communities for the production of goods and
services can be equally (if not more) efective in maintaining forest
cover than those managed under solely protection objectives [7-9]. In
Uttarakhand Himalaya biodiversity conservation outside the protected
area system is rich because of close relationship between religious,
socio-cultural beliefs and conservation [10,11]. hese informal
protected areas are important from the conservation point of view.
hese areas include sacred groves, which exhibit rich loral and faunal
diversity with some rare and threatened plant species present in them
and indicate an ecosystem with various life forms [12].
Over the past few decades, the view that biodiversity rich areas
partially or largely managed by local residents, sometimes referred to
as community-conserved areas (CCAs), can be efective in saving
species from extinction, has gained considerable ground [13,14].
Several ecological studies have been carried out in sacred forest
patches. Floristic composition of sacred groves in diferent parts of
India viz., Karnatka [15], Kerala [16], Pondicherry [17], West Bengal
[18], Meghalaya [19] and Manipur [20] have been studied by number
of researchers. Several ecological investigations have been made in
sacred groves of Meghalaya [21-23]. In Uttarakhand [11,24,25] has
carried out some studies in and described ecological studies in
community conserved and sacred forests. Khumbangmayum et al.
made detailed ecological study of four sacred groves of Manipur and
found that biological spectrum of the groves is similar to normal
Earth Science & Climatic Change
Pala et al., J Earth Sci Clim Change 2016, 7:2
http://dx.doi.org/10.4172/2157-7617.1000334
Research Article Open Access
J Earth Sci Clim Change
ISSN:2157-7617 JESCC, an open access journal
Volume 7 • Issue 2 • 1000334