Ethnobotany of three sea grass species from Port Blair, a step towards its conservation in Andaman Islands

oleh: Mohammed Naufal, GadiPadmavati

Format: Article
Diterbitkan: University of Brawijaya 2021-02-01

Deskripsi

Ethno-phycology is the study of the relationships of human society to flora and its ecosystem. In the marine world, ethno-biology is a thriving research area, which hasyielded valuable ethno-biological knowledge. The main goal of the present study was to understand the effect of abiotic factors and the natural and anthropo-genic disturbances that shape the sea-grass community in Andaman Island and reveal the local people's knowledgeabout the significance of sea-grass habitat and its conservation. The qualitative study on the distribution of sea-grasses in Chidi-yatapu (11° 29' 30" to 11° 30' 34" N and 92° 35' 10" to 92° 42' 30" E) was carried out during December2012 to February 2013. A total of three sea-grass species such as Thalassia hempirichi (Ehrenberg) Ascherson, 1871, Halodule uninervis (R.Brown) J.D.Hooker1858, Halophila ovalis (Forsskål) Ascherson 1882,where identified. Among them, T. hempirichi, and H. ovalisfound in this study was re-ported to have the ethno-medicinal value from west coast of India. As a part of the study, the semi-structured survey was carried out among the local coastal people to analyse the Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK). Thesurvey has revealed the unawareness of coastal residents about the medicinal, nutritional, andconserva-tional values of sea-grasses. Apracticalimplementation has to be taken to make them aware that sea-grasses are fundamental components of healthy marine eco-systems and the local livelihoods that rely on them. The present findings provide the first report on the ethno-phycology of sea-grasses from South Andaman Island.