CONCLUSION

Forests of the Western Ghats, one of the global biodiversity hotspots, have been steadily affected by human activities, especially since the introduction of agriculture. In traditional, community centered, pre-colonial land use, however, a sustainable balance was maintained between farmers and forests. This was facilitated through maintenance of a decentralized system of forest reserves, the sacred groves, in a mosaic of landscape elements which had shifting cultivation areas, secondary forests on fallows in different stages of vegetational succession, rice fields and spice gardens in valleys, and savannized lands as pastures. Network of natural water courses and swamps, covered with characteristic tree species of rarer kind would have been key feature of central Western Ghats. As historical records of Uttara Kannada testify, the pre and early colonial period up to mid-19^th century was also one of richest wildlife as well. The many patches of sacred forests, often hundreds of hectares in extent, functioned as favorable pockets for persistence of several sensitive climax species of the Western Ghats, which could not easily re-colonize the fire burnt fallows and savannas. Their remains today are the relic forests, the subject of this paper.

State monopoly over forests, beginning with the British, early in the 19^th century, spelt an end to the community-based landscape management. Most sacred groves, secondary forests and other unclaimed lands came under state monopoly as reserve forests. State driven and revenue oriented forest management policies focused mainly on timber extraction and on raising of tree plantations. Even the sacred groves of primeval nature were treated like any other forests. Whereas such relic forests, remaining isolated amidst human habitations suffered from extraction pressures from local people themselves, who were denied their traditional rights in the reserved forests, the larger groves of thinly populated areas got merged with secondary forests and lost their sacred value. Their remains today with rare relic species went almost unrecognized in conservation circles, until studies have been initiated from the angle of ecological history.

Our study at Kathalekan in Central Western Ghats, reveal that the forest is a mosaic of primary forest rich in relic trees like Dipterocarpus and Palaquium and a network of perennial streams and swamps sheltering Semecarpus kathalekanensis, Syzygium travancoricum, Myristica magnifica, Gymnacranthera canarica (the last three in threat categories of IUCN Red List). Persistence of these Western Ghat endemics, and relic species in this forest calls for serious attention from conservationists and forest managers to initiate programs immediately for recognizing and salvaging more fragments of such ancient forests that lie hidden amidst a sea of secondary forests. The fact that water course forests have not only rare species but also high biomass and greater carbon sequestration potential also calls for revision of forest management policies, as the innumerable stream courses of Western Ghats offer tremendous potential for carbon stocking per unit area while also bettering the hydrology of these mountains, which form the main watershed for the entire Indian Peninsula. Millions of subsistence farmers and other forest dwellers of Western Ghats can not only be partners in micro-level planning for prudent water use but also stand to gain in a big way from carbon credits for their new role as promoters and guardians of watershed vegetation. Rendering such service for mitigating global climatic change can also, same time, serve well the cause of relic forests and relic species in an otherwise much impacted biodiversity hotspot.