Natural vegetation | Geography of India| UPSC | UP-PCS | State PCS

Table of Contents:

• What is Natural Vegetation?
• Factors affecting the distribution and development of natural vegetation
• Types of natural forest in India
• UPSC previous years Questions

Natural vegetation

Natural vegetation is plant species that is grown naturally without human help or human interference, it is also known as Virgin vegetation,  all of the needs are provided by the environment.

For example,

• Forest are natural vegetation
• Crops, mangoes trees, plantation trees are not natural vegetation. ,

Natural vegetation is three broad categories:

• Forest
• Grassland
• Shrubs.

Grassland and Shrubs( small to medium size plants) are not extensively found in India, they are co-exited with the forest.

Flora terms used to denote plant species for a particular region or a particular period.

Fauna works also denote animal species in a particular region or period.

Factor affecting the natural vegetation distributions and formations:

• Relief
• Land
• Soil
• Climate 
• Photoperiod
• Temperature
• Precipitation

Land:

• Land affects natural vegetation directly and indirectly. Natural vegetation is different in mountainous, plain, dry, and wet regions.
• For example, fertile lands suitable for Agriculture and forest and shelter of a variety of wildlife are found in rough terrain.

Soil:

• Different Types of soil provide different types of vegetation.
• Sandy soil of desert support cactus and Thorny brushes.
• Wet, Marshy, delta soil support mangrove, and deltaic vegetation.
• Hilly slope conical tree.

Temperature;

• Different forests are found in different types of temperatures.
• For examples, tropical forest found where more than 24 degrees mean annual temperature
• Subtropical forest; 17 to 24 degrees centigrade.
• Temperate; 7 to 17-degree centigrade
• Alpine vegetation: below 7 degrees centigrade.

Photoperiod ( sunlight):

• Duration of sunlight is different at different locations due to differences in latitude, altitudes, season on the duration of days.
• The tree grows faster in summer due to the longer duration of sunlight.

Precipitation:

• Areas of heavy rainfall have more dense vegetation as compared to areas of less rainfall.
• For examples,
• The southern slope of the Himalayan is more vegetation as compared to the northern slope of vegetation.
• The western slope of western ghats has more vegetation as compared to the eastern slope.

Types of natural vegetation in India;

• Tropical evergreen forest
• Tropical deciduous forest
• Tropical Thorny and Scrubs forest
• Montane forest
• Mangrove forest

Tropical evergreen forest:

Characteristics:

• It is found in areas having more than 200 cm and short dry seasons.
• Tree reach Up to 60 meters
• Due to warmth and wet throughout the year, luxurious vegetation of all kinds of trees, shrubs, and creepers give multiplayer structure.
• No definite time to shed the leaves hence looks evergreen all over the year.
• Important trees:
• Ebony, Mahogany, Rosewood, Rubber, Cinchona.

Region:

• The Western Ghats, Lakshadweep, and Andaman Nicobar, Tamil Nadu coast, Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Tripura, Manipur, West Bengal coast.

Tropical deciduous forest:

Most widespread forest in India. It is also called the monsoon forest of India found areas where rainfall having between 70 to 200 cm.
Trees shed their leaves for about six to eight weeks in the dry season. It further divided into:

• Moist tropical deciduous forest
• Dry tropical deciduous forest

Moist tropical deciduous forest:

• Rainfall 100 to 200 cm
• Regions: foothills of Himalayas, Jharkhand, west Odisha, Chhatisgarh, Eastern slope of Western Ghats.
• Trees: Forest, Bamboo, Sal, Shisham, sandalwood, Khair, mulberry.

Dry deciduous forest:

• Rainfall between 70 to 100 cm.
• Region:
• Peninsular plateau, UP, and plain of Bihar
• Trees:
• Teak, sal, peepal neem.

The thorn forest and scrubs:

• The region have less than 70 cm of rainfall annually has thorns forest and scrubs.
• Region:
• The northwestern part of India comprises a semi-arid area of Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhatisgarh, UP, and Haryana.
• Plants:
• Acacia
• Palms
• Euphabid
• Cactus

Montane forest:

In mountainous regions, temperature decrease with an increase in altitude leads to a change in the natural vegetation. A succession of vegetation can be seen in the same order as we see from tropical to tundra regions.
1000-2000 meters:

• Wet temperate forest
• Evergreen broad leave tree
• Oak and chestnut tree.

1500-3000 meters:

• Temperate forest containing coniferous trees like pine, deodars, silver fir, spruce, cedar,
• Found on the southern slopes of the Himalayas.

3600-4500 meters:

• Temperate grassland
• Common plants:
• Silver fir,
• Juniper,
• Pines
• Birchen,

Altitude more than 4500 meters:

• Mosses, lichen, tundra plant.

Mangrove Forest:

• Mangrove is a tidal forest found in tidal areas along the coast where mud and silt are accumulated.
• Roots of plants submerged under Water.
• Region:
• Delta of Ganga, Mahanadi, Godavari, Krishna, Kaveri
• Trees:
• Sundari, Palm, Coconut, Keora, Agar.
• Sundari trees are durable hard timbers.

UPSC previous years Questions:

• Discuss the spatial distribution of natural vegetation in India with the help of a sketch map. (UPSC 2010)

• Explain the sequence of vegetation zones of the Himalayas. (UPSC 2001)

• Discuss the distribution and characteristics of the evergreen forest in India. (UPSC 1996)

• Explain the geographical factors responsible for the growth of mangrove vegetation in India. (UPSC 1993)

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