Conserving Biodiversity through Sacred Groves in Pudukkottai District

Pudukkottai is a small district which had a lot of rich forests earlier. Later, all these thick forests were cleared for eucalyptus plantation to feed the paper and rayon factories. Much of the biodiversity has been lost due to the monoculture of eucalyptus. There a quite a few sacred groves in this district which still harbour a substantial number of the native flora and fauna and continue to offer the ecosystem services. But many of them are slowly getting degraded due to human intrusion, cattle grazing and invasion by exotic species like Prosopsis. Conservation of these sacred groves will help in conserving biodiversity and also restore the valuable ecosystem services. Conservation measures should aim to improve the conservation status of the existing sacred groves and to replicate these in other areas available for plantation.