It may be noted that the District of Kottayam naturally falls into three divisions, viz of the lowlands, the midlands and highlands. The topography of the district is highly undulating with hills and valleys. The vegetation being divided into three catergories such as lowland vegetaion, midland vegetation, and highland vegetation.
The flora presents a systematic account of a total of 1102 species belonging to 690 genera and 153 families of seed plants. Five new records and two new verities have been discovered from the district. An anslysis of the flora showed that 94 species are endemic which formed 8.5 per cent of the total species. About 16 species are rare/threatened/endangered catergory. Each species is provided with detailed up-to-date nomenclatural citations including synonymous if any, descriptions, phenology, distribution, and notes on nomenclature, uses etc. If any. Illustrations of certain species are also provided. The comprehensive floristic account will be of immense value and assistance to the botanists, agriculturists, foresters, nature conservationists, ethno botanists, and to all the scientists working in allied disciplines. |
