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Mountain tourism: the Gorkhey story
Full text linkLocated on Darjeeling’s north-west boundary, the Singalila National Park borders Nepal to its west and Sikkim to its north. Singalila is a small park of 78.60 square kilometers with a 2200-3660 m elevation range. The park’s flora includes rhododendrons and coniferous species including temperate, broad leaf and subtropical variants. The famed Singalila ridge and its slopes are a medley of bamboo, oak, magnolia, hemlock, silver fir and rhododendron forests. Phalut and Sandakphu are two popular summits on the Singalila ridge. Indian and international tourists avail the services of organized treks to the ridge. Gorkhey is a village in the buffer of the Singalila National Park. Gorkhey is now a much patronized trek initiating point. “Green Gorkhey”, “beautiful village”, “A Lesser Known Beauty” are some typical online tourist platitudes. Such ‘beauty’ and other aesthetic and recreational opportunities for tourists are considered in conservation circles as a ‘cultural’ service of the forest ecosystem. But what are the roles of Gorkhey’s families in production and delivery of this cultural service? What are the implications of tourism for the wellbeing of Rai, Chettri and Sherpa families? Here is what the village has to say. Their opinions and observations largely pertain to economic benefits of tourism and related energy options; and an evaluation of socio-cultural implications of tourism
The rarest by the road
Full text linkset my alarm for 4:30 am to ensure that I get an early start on my fieldwork. To my surprise, I woke up to pleasant notes of song birds although there was still an hour to go till sunrise. I dragged myself out of bed and by the time my assistant Sameer and I were ready to leave, the orange rays of the sun had lit up the morning sky. Soon a purple-orange hue accompanied the cacophony of busy bulbuls, barbets and the blue whistling thrush – common birds in this landscape. It was a perfect prelude to what lay in store for us. There was Gurung daju (daju means ‘brother’ in Nepali), our guide waiting for us scantily clad – while we stood buried under layers. He addressed me as ‘madam’ instead of the usual bahini (sister) more commonly used in the region. What struck us about Gurung daju was his humility. The day before he had helped us carry our heavy soil corer (instrument used for soil profiling) up the hill. Contrary to our assumption of him being the caretaker, he turned out to be the owner
and a small tea grower – an entrepreneur in his own right. In addition to his diverse entrepreneurial activities he was also an avid birder
Fine- and local- scale genetic structure of Dysoxylum malabaricum,a late-successional canopy tree species in disturbed forest patches in the Western Ghats, India
No full textDysoxylum malabaricum (white cedar) is an economically important tree species, endemic to the Western Ghats, India, which is the world’s most densely populated
biodiversity hotspot. In this study, we used variation
at ten nuclear simple sequence repeat loci to investigate
genetic diversity and fine scale spatial genetic structure (FSGS) in seedlings and adults of D.malabaricum from four forest patches in the northern part of the Western Ghats. When genetic variation was compared between seedlings and adults across locations, significant differences were detected in allelic richness, observed heterozygosity, fixation index (FIS), and relatedness (P\0.05). Reduced genetic diversity and increased relatedness at the seedling stage might be due to fragmentation and disturbance. There was no FSGS at the adult stage and FSGS was limited to shorter distance classes at the seedling stage. However, there was clear spatial genetic structure at the landscape level (\50 km), regardless of age class, due to limited gene flow between forest patches. A comparison of the distributions of size classes in the four locations with published data from a more southern area, showed that large trees (diameter at breast height, DBH, [130 cm) are present in the southern sacred forests but not in the northern forest reserves. This pattern is likely due to stronger harvesting pressure in the north compared to the south, because in the north there are no cultural taboos
regulating the extraction of natural resources. The implications for forest conservation in this biodiversity hotspot are discussed
Notes from the Other Side of a Forest Fire
Full text linkAlthough widely used as a tool in forest management
across the world, causing fires is illegal in Indian forests. This article points out that the present understanding of fire as essentially disruptive has
its antecedents in a colonial perspective that came from seeing the forest primarily as a source of timber. However, the practices of indigenous communities as well as the insights of ecological studies point to the importance of using fire in controlled ways to manage dry and deciduous forest ecosystems
What going organic means for biodiversity conservation and human wellbeing in Darjeeling's tea estates
Full text linkDarjeeling is famous for three things – the misty mountains, the view of the majestic Kanchenjunga and the world famous Darjeeling tea. However, little do people know that Darjeeling is also home to the Chinese pangolin (Manis pentadactyla), one of the most poached animals in the world according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, 2014. Its scales and meat are in high demand across Southeast Asia
Robot-assisted measurement for hydrologic understanding in data sparse regions
Full text linkThis article describes the field application of small, low-cost robots for remote surface data collection and an automated workflow to support water balance computations and hydrologic understanding where water availability data is sparse. Current elevation measurement approaches,
such as manual surveying and LiDAR, are costly and infrequent, leading to potential inefficiencies for
quantifying the dynamic hydrologic storage capacity of the land surface over large areas. Experiments to evaluate a team of two different robots, including an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) and an unmanned surface vehicle (USV), to collect hydrologic surface data utilizing sonar and visual sensors were conducted at three different field sites within the Arkavathy Basin river network located near
Bangalore in Karnataka, South India. Visual sensors were used on the UAV to capture high resolution imagery for topographic characterization, and sonar sensors were deployed on the USV to capture bathymetric readings; the data streams were fused in an automated workflow to determine the storage capacity of agricultural reservoirs (also known as “tanks”) at the three field sites. This study suggests: (i) this robot-assisted methodology is low-cost and suitable for novice users, and (ii) storage capacity data collected at previously unmapped locations revealed strong power-type relationships between surface area, stage, and storage volume, which can be incorporated into modeling of landscape-scale hydrology. This methodology is of importance to water researchers and practitioners because it produces local, high-resolution representations of bathymetry and topography and enables water balance computations at small-watershed scales, which offer insight into the present-day dynamics of a strongly human impacted watershed
Death knell for citizen-led lake governance
Full text linkBengaluruhas become a bit notorious globally as videos of Bellandur lake catching fire and its froth blocking roads over the past couple of years have gone viral. But Bengaluru’s lakes areal so famous for another reason: the enormous citizen activism that has led to the protection, rejuvenation and beautification of many of its lakes, and the continued citizen efforts to save and revive the remaining ones
The nitty gritty of a name: Systematic biology and conservation
Full text linkEffective conservation and management of biological diversity depends on our understanding of taxonomy. Taxonomy is the science of naming, describing, and classifying flora, fauna, and microorganisms. Taxonomists
identify, describe, and classify species—including those that are new to science—on the basis of characteristics that include morphology, behaviour, genetics, ecology,
and biochemistry. Systematics, on the other hand, is about the evolutionary inter-relationships of each and every named and described organism. Thus, taxonomy and systematics provide basic knowledge of biological diversity to underpin conservation, management, and implementation of national commitments under the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). Unfortunately, inadequate taxonomic information hinders our ability to
make informed decisions about conservation, sustainable use, and benefit sharing
Commensal in conflict: Livestock depredation patterns by freeranging domestic dogs in the Upper Spiti Landscape, Himachal Pradesh, India
No full textIn human-populated landscapes worldwide, domestic dogs (Canis lupus familiaris) are the most abundant terrestrial carnivore. Although dogs have been used for the protection of livestock from wild carnivores, they have also been implicated as predators of livestock. We used a combination of methods (field surveys, interview surveys, and data from secondary sources) to examine the patterns and factors driving livestock depredation by free-ranging dogs, as well as economic losses to local communities in a Trans-Himalayan agropastoralist landscape in India. Our results show that
livestock abundance was a better predictor of depredation
in the villages than local dog abundance. Dogs mainly killed small-bodied livestock and sheep were the most selected prey. Dogs were responsible for the majority of livestock losses, with losses being comparable to that by snow leopards. This high level of conflict may disrupt community benefits from conservation programs and potentially undermine the conservation efforts in the region through a range of cascading effects
Forest protection in Central India: do differences in monitoring by state and local institutions result in diverse social and ecological impacts?
No full textProtection of forests and wildlife outside protected areas (PAs) is necessary for the conservation of wildlife. Extension of conservation efforts outside the existing PA may result in restrictions on local forest resource use. Such situations arise due to differences in understanding of forest as a resource for communities and as a conservation space for endangered species. A clearer focus is needed on the functionality and socio-ecological outcomes of different forest management institutions to address such issues. We conducted a study in a forest landscape connecting Pench and Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserves (TRs) in Central India. The two main forest management institutions were the Forest Department (FD) and local communities managing forest resources. We conducted vegetation surveys and focus group discussions in 15 villages selected based on presence or absence of active protection and monitoring of forest resources by either FD or local people. We found that
forests with monitoring had significantly higher tree density and vegetation species richness compared to forests without monitoring. Tree density was observed to be higher in sites monitored by villagers rather than those monitored by FD. Self-regulation and resource sharing in locally monitored forests were more acceptable to local communities.
In forests monitored by the FD, local communities indicated a feeling of alienation from the forest that weakened their motivation to protect the forest and wildlife. Recognition of local community rights is essential to achieve conservation goals and reduce social conflicts outside PAs, requiring collaboration between state and local institutions