Documentation of Urban Trees in Chitradurga, Karnataka

Abstract

Many of the world’s major cities have implemented tree planting programs based on assumed environmental and social benefits of urban forests. Urban trees serve many useful functions such as climate change mitigation by carbon sequestration, air quality improvement by air pollution abatement, biodiversity conservation and source of ecosystem goods to urban inhabitants. They also have aesthetic, socio-religious and recreational value in urban contexts. In spite of the importance, they have not received much scientific attention. In this work, aimed to documentation and identification of trees. A survey was conducted during Dec-2022 to Decmber-2023. This paper investigates the diversity of tree species growing both within the built environment as well as road-side avenues in the seaside town of Chitradurga which is the administrative headquarters of Chitradurga district of Karnataka. The preliminary study of tree flora of Chitradurga comprises of about 89 species in which majority are indigenous species and few others involve exotic and introduced species. The dominant genera are Ficus, Terminalia, Artocarpus and Syzygium. The dominant species are Pongamia pinnata, Alstonia scholaris, Thespesia populnea, Terminalia catappa, Spathodia campanulata, Ficus religiosa and Bauhinia purpurea. The tree diversity represents a good assemblage of different utility categories such as wild and cultivated fruit yielding trees, shade and ornamental trees, sacred and religious trees, etc. Besides the high proportion of older trees of Rain tree and Ficus, presence of wild fruit yielding trees like Artocarpus incisus and Spondias pinnata, large sized sacred trees such as Ficus religiosa and F. benghalensis, rare medicinal species such as Garcinia indica, Saraca asoca, Terminalia bellirica, etc., are some of the notable features of the urban tree flora of Chitradurga.