Linkages among forest, water, and wildlife: a case study from Kalapani community forest in Lamahi bottleneck area in Terai Arc Landscape.

Abstract

Forest and water are important entities for sustaining life on earth. In a terrestrial ecosystem, linkages between the entities creates a mosaic benefiting the wildlife by creating the suitable habitat. In turn, communities get benefits stemming up from ecosystem services such as fodder, fuelwood, and water. We present a case study from a forest restoration project to assess the linkages between forest, water and wildlife across Lamahi bottleneck area in Terai Arc Landscape. We used combination of surveys such as forest area and canopy cover change (2001-2016) analysis followed by household questionnaire, water hole, camera trapping including process documentation. Forest area has increased by ~20 km2 in last 16 yrs. followed by number of water spouts along the identified tributaries. Water spouts are conserved in the form of conservation pond by the communities living downstream and utilized in the vegetable farming. Communities have benefited financially (~ US$ 1,252) contributing to their income level from the sale of fresh season vegetables in nearby market. Camera trap survey including the assessment of historical records showed presence of wildlife including elephant, hyena and other small carnivores in and around bottleneck forest. Both, motivation and enthusiastic support from local communities followed by the conducive government policies led to improve condition of natural resources over the period. This has also created a mosaic habitat for wildlife forming functional connectivity along the linear Terai Arc Landscape.

Keywords

• linkage, forest, water, wildlife, community forest, connectivity, terai arc landscape