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FOREST FORMATIONS AND SUCCESSIONS 

 OF THE SAT TAL VALLEY, KUMAON 

 HIMALAYAS 



By 



L. A. Kenoyer, M.A., Ph.D. 



Allahabad Agricultural Institute, Allahabad. 



Location and Climate. 



The Himalayan range, the highest mountain range of the world, 

 deserves far more attention from the ecological standpoint than it 

 has received. It is given merely a passing notice by such authors 

 as Schimper (10) and Warming (12). This survey of a limited area 

 is given with the hope that it may stimulate the botanists of India 

 to further researches in this most fruitful field. 



Sat Tal is in the Kumaon Division, United Provinces, India, at 

 a latitude of 29° 23' north and a longitude of 79° 32' east. It takes 

 its name from the existence some time ago of seven lakes, probably 

 produced by the blocking of the drainage by landsides. Three of 

 these lakes remain, one of them being over 90 and another over 

 80 feet in depth. 



The region included in this study is the drainage basin of these 

 lakes which almost coincides with the Sat Tal estate and has a 

 length from north to south of one mile and a width from east to 

 west of one-half mile. This valley lies just behind the outer range 

 of the Himalayas, the drainage to the south of it going rather direct- 

 ly to the plains. The lowest lake has an altitude of about 4160 ft. 

 and the highest peak, that at the north end of the valley, of 5860 ft. 

 Some of the observations, particularly those related to biotic factors, 

 were made outside the above-mentioned area. 



This valley was selected for this study because it is at the 

 altitude in which the prevailing formations of the lower Himalayas 

 meet and because the fact that it is a private estate which has for fifty 

 years been protected from cutting, grazing, and cultivation as well 

 as the fact that it is a depression relatively protected from both 

 hot and cold winds give it the richest flora which the author has 

 seen in any area of similar size in the Himalayas. Something of its 

 actual wealth in species is shown by the fact that it contains about 

 75 species of trees and 65 species' of shrubs. Great Britain has about 

 10 kinds of trees, and all Europe only 85 (1). 



