A. Ramachandran , S. Jayakumar , A. R. Mohamed Haroon , A. Bhaskaran

Abstract

In response to growing concern on global climatic change, carbon management in forests is inevitable in order to offset the carbon emission in the atmosphere. Forests act as a sink for the CO₂ to mitigate the global climatic change. In developing countries like India, due to various need based forest management practices, cultivations, forest fire, etc, there has been a continuous loss of original biodiversity and soil. These degradations led to a loss of sequestered carbon of standing biomass and in the soil as well. The total area under forest cover in Kolli hills is about 27,103 ha. The total biomass carbon estimated is about 2.74 Tg. The total SOC estimated in the forest area is about 3.18 Tg. The ratio between the biomass carbon and SOC is much less than the tropical forests of the world. This indicates that there has been a heavy degradation of forest especially of forest soil. Hence, restoration of soil organic carbon (SOC) lost over the period of time due to anthropogenic interferences has to be built up and maintained with minimum threshold to support the tree growth. A pioneer attempt is made to identify the minimum threshold of surface SOC to the level of 1.2% to be maintained in the forest floor. This paper analyzes the intricacies of biomass carbon and SOC in a degraded condition. Detailed strategies for sustainable management of these degraded forests are discussed.

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A. Ramachandran , S. Jayakumar , D. I. Arockiasamy

Abstract

Forests, one of the important natural resources on the earth surface fulfill all the needs of living beings on the earth. For effective management of forests, it is important to have information on recent status, composition and types. Champion and Seth system of classification of Indian forest types has been used as an authentic source of information since it has been released for all management purposes. However one should remember that Champion and Seth classified the entire forests in India with limited technology, time and resources available with them. Hence there are certain forest areas where forest types are represented sporadically in the Champion and Seth system of classification. This classification naturally will have several shortcomings since it is done on macro scale. Now we have newer technologies, facilities like Remote Sensing, GIS, GPS with which we can understand the forests at micro-level and consequently more fine classification system could be evolved to reclassify the Forests in India. Eastern Ghats of Tamil Nadu is one such forest region, which has been taken up in the present study for further refinement. Remote sensing technique has been utilized appropriately in the present study for classification of forests with detailed field survey. Area belong to each forest type have been calculated accurately. The results of this study emphasize that refinement of forest types in India is necessary for better management of forests.

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A. Ramachandran , S. Soosairaj , S. Jayakumar

Abstract

No abstract

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A. Ramachandran , S. Soosairaj , S. Jayakumar

Abstract

Geophila repens, a rare species from the family Rubiaceae was believed to be restricted in its distribution to the Western Ghats of Peninsular India. The present collection from the Pacchaimalai hills, Eastern Ghats is a new report to this region. An illustration and description of this species is specified.

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