Mudumalai Forest Dynamics Plot, India

In 1988, a Forest Dynamics Plot was set up in Mudumalai Game Reserve in the eastern foothills of the Western Ghat Mountains of Southern India by the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore and STRI. The Mudumalai forest is seasonal semi-evergreen lowland forest, typical of the lowland dry teak forest of the Indian subcontinent. Mudumalai is much less diverse than the other Forest Dynamics Plots surveyed to date, with 76 species and about 26,000 stems. The forest is an open-canopy woodland with grass cover that is subject to nearly annual fires and to browsing by large herds of elephants. A major focus, with significance for forest management practices through much of India, is the impact of fire and elephants on forest regeneration. The plot is recensused every year, although diameter measurements are not taken during every census. Remeasurement censuses have occurred in 1992, 1996, and 2000.