A BOTANICAL TOUR IN THE TINNEVELLY HILLS 
By 
M. S. Ramaswami , M.A. 
Officiating Curator of the Herbarium , Royal Botanic Garden, Calcutta. 
rFHE following is a brief account of a botanical excursion undertaken 
x by the writer and Mr. D. Hooper, late Economic Botanist to trie 
Botanical Survey of India, in the month of February 1913, to a portion of 
the Tinnevelly hills, in accordance with instructions from Major A. T. Gage, 
Director of the Botanical Survey of India. 
Topography and Nature of the Vegetation. 
The District of Tinnevelly is roughly triangular in shape, occupying 
the eastern half of the extreme southern epd of the Indian Peninsula. 11 
is bounded on the west by the Western Ghats, on the east and south by the 
sea, on the north by the district of Madura and “lies between 8° 9' and 
9° 43' N. and 77° 12' and 78° 23' E„ having an area of 5,389 square miles 
with an extreme length of 120 miles from north to south and a maximum 
width of 75 miles near the Madura frontier.” 
The district can be divided naturally into three distinct portions : — 
(1) The coast, with back waters, Avicennia type of growth and salt- 
swamps. 
(2) The plains between the coast and the western hill slopes, with a 
few low stony hills covered with a poor scrubby growth and 
long stretches of shifting red sand known locally as the Teri. 
The Palmyra is the principal feature of this region. 
(3) The ghat slopes on the west with elevations ranging from 300 ft. 
to 6,000 ft. It is from these the district gradually slopes down 
eastward to the sea. The outer slopes are often very bare and 
sometimes covered with a few grasses and some scattered trees, 
more or less deciduous. The inner slopes, however, contain much 
evergreen forest, frequently even at low elevations, and above 
2,500 ft. very large stretches of regular moist heavy evergreen 
shola. These shola forests lie mostly in 3 taluks, viz., Tenkasi, 
A m basamudram and Nanguneri. In Tenkasi the slopes face 
nearly north, in Am basamudram and Nanguneri nearly west, 
with a distinct corner ground by an outlying spur between the 
two. 
It is to a few of the sholas situated on the slopes of the last named 
t vo taluks our excursion was confined. 
B 
