UTILIZATION AND CONSERVATION OF FLORA IN THE HOME GARDENS OF SOME RESIDENTIAL AREAS, COIMBATORE

Home garden can serve as an important source of both food and cash income for vulnerable households. The objectives of this study were to documenting the flora of the home gardens, obtaining their frequency and to categorize the plants into medicinal/other economically important species according to their utility value in 10 different residential areas of Coimbatore city. The home garden surveys revealed that totally 90 species, were enlisted in the sampled areas and of them the higher species richness of 26 were found in Vadavalli residential area. Overall 47 families were recorded, among them Acanthaceae and Apocyanaceae were more dominant families in the study sites. In the species content 72 were recognized as medicinally important and 18 as ornamental. It was further known that the residents of middle class earned sizeable income through vegetables in addition to fulfilling their day to day need while the residents of upper class highly preferring ornamental species. Few species like Saraca indica, the endemics are well protected by cultivation in homegardens. Thus the present study presumes that home gardens satisfy various household needs and conserve medicinally valuable species.


INTRODUCTION
Home gardens are species-rich agroforestry systems maintained on the basis of choice, needs and importance of plants. It is a traditional land use practice around a homestead where several plant species are maintained by members of the house hold and their products are intended to be an economically consumption (Shrestha et al., 2001). Compared to other agricultural or horticultural ecosystems, home gardens are having rich species content and well suited for ex situ conservation of many rare/endangered species, besides fruit and timber trees. Home garden structure also varies from place to place according to the local physical environment, ecological characteristics, socioeconomic and cultural factors (Abdoellah, 1990;Kumar and Nair, 2004).
Coimbatore is the leading industrial city in southern India. The industrial areas, educational institutions and residential areas are maintaining home gardens almost in all parts of the city. Generally, greens and other vegetable crops are maintained to meet the demand of day to day life. However, many upper economic class people and educated people maintained their home gardens with many ornamental plants and some plants of red listed categories also. Despite the well establishment of home gardens no taxonomical and ecological studies have been made so far in Coimbatore city. To address this lacuna, the present study has been carried out in 10 houses which spread all over the Coimbatore city in different locations and aimed to document the flora of the home gardens, calculating their frequency and to categorize the plants based on their utility value.

Sampling places
A total number of 10 home gardens with different sizes located in the places viz., R.S. Puram, Race course, G.N. Mills, Viswasapuram, Ganapathy, Vadavalli, Manikarapalayam, Mettupalayam, Nava India and Saravanampatti were selected for the present study in Coimbatore city. The home gardens selected were explored for the plant species for the informations on habit, family, parts used and medicinal/other economic uses. The degree of distribution of various plant species among the home gardens was determined as per the following formula: The medicinal and other economic uses of the plant species present in the home gardens of sampling places were documented on the basis of personal interview with the respective gardener of the institutions, local public and the owners of the residential homes and by available literature. The red listed and endemic plants were enlisted according to Ahmedullah and Nair (1987).

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
For the present study, all over the city of Coimbatore, 10 home gardens in 10 different residential areas have been selected to enumerate the species taxonomically and to evaluate ecologically (Table 1 and Fig. 1). The sizes of the home gardens sampled were also varied much between ca. 25m 2 and 225m 2 . In this range most of the home gardens were within the global inventory range of other tropical home gardens (Fernandez and Nair, 1986). The number of species and their numerical strength were not in accordance with the size of the home gardens studied in Coimbatore city. Studies of home gardens in Mexico (Rico Gray et al., 1991) and Indonesia (Abdoellah et al., 2006) indicated that the number of species or individuals is not related to home garden size. The species richness was noted to be varied between the home gardens studied. The higher species richness of 26 was present in the home garden of Vadavalli residential area. On the other hand, the lower species richness of 11 was noted in the residential areas of R.S. Puram.
Altogether, 90 plant species belongs to different life forms were noted to be present in the studied home gardens. A higher number of 46 species (51.1%) were in the form of herbs followed by the shrubs with 26 species (28.9%), trees with 14 species (15.6%) and climbers with 4 species (4.4%) ( Table 1). This may be due to the need and individual option. The most grown herbs in the gardens are mainly for the purpose of supplying requirements to their day to day life as vegetables, greens and medicinal plants.
In addition to higher species diversity, the diversity of families was noted to be most noteworthy (Table 2). A total number of 47 families with the contribution of 90 species were present in the home gardens. The family, Acanthaceae contributed the higher number of 7 species (7.8%) followed by the family, Apocyanaceae with 6 species (6.7%) and Asteraceae, Amaranthaceae and Solanaceae with 5 species (5.6%) each to the communities of home gardens. The remaining families have contributed 1, 2 or 3 species only to home garden communities. It indicates the diverse utility of the plant resources particularly the preferences towards medicinal uses (Kumar et al., 1994). The high floristic diversity is perhaps the reflection of the potential of home gardens to serve as repositories of genetic diversity as well (Esquivel and Hammer, 1992). Kabir and Webb (2008) also reported the predominance of herbs and trees in the home gardens of south western Bangladesh.
The degree of distribution of the various enumerated plant species was very low and it was ranging between 10 and 50% only ( Table 1). The species namely, Adenium obesum, Anthurium spathyiphyllum, Aloe vera, Ficus benjamina, Plumbago auriculata and Plumeria rubra have registered 50% frequency which indicates that these species have distributed comparatively in higher number of home gardens (Fig. 2). Other species have recorded below 50% frequency and hence these species have restricted distribution in few home gardens only. The total number of individuals maintained for the constituent species in the home gardens was widely varied (Table 1 and  The economic importance including the medicinal uses of the various plant species present in the sampled home gardens of Coimbatore city is presented in Table 2. In the account of 90 species, 72 (80%) were recognized as medicinally important and 18 (20%) as ornamentals. The medicinal uses of the plant species are multidimensional. A greater number of 16 species are used to treat inflammation related diseases, 13 species prescribed for skin problems, 10 species are suggested for diabetics and 8 species are used for anticancer. Ecological and socioeconomic factors, including geographic location, climate, water availability, garden size and history, agricultural policy, market needs, food cultivars and house hold preferences influence the species diversity and utilization of the product of traditional home gardens (Gajaseni and Gajaseni, 1999;Trinh et al., 2003). Herb Solanum xanthocarpum Sch and wend.
Herb  In is used to treat infectious diseases while simultaneously mitigating many of the side effects. Seeds are used as a diuretic. Leaves are used as a painkiller, a treatment for nausea, 37.
Cucumis pepo Cucurbitaceae and seed and a boost to haemoglobin content of the blood. The fruit is used for cooling and astringent to the bowels, increases appetite, cures leprosy and purifies the blood. A fresh juice is commonly used in many skin conditions, including eczema, chicken 38.

39.
Calotropis gigantea Asclepiadaceae Leaf and The powdered root is used to treat bronchitis, asthma, leprosy, eczema, pulcherrima bark latex elephantiasis while the latex is used to treat vertigo, baldness, hair loss, toothache, intermittent fevers, rheumatoid/joint swellings and paralysis.

40.
Carica papaya Caricaceae Leaf, fruit and root Seed, root It increase appetite, ease menstrual pain, meat tenderizer and relieve nausea The seeds were included in a host of prescriptions for fever, diarrhoea, vomiting, 41.

42.
Cardiospermum Sapindaceae halicacabum and leaf Leaf and fruit indigestion as in stomach and carminative. Leaves are given for biliousness, intestinal irritations, heartburn, thirst and nausea. Volatile oil is carminative.
The tender shoots are used as a diuretic, stomachic and rubefacient. It is used in rheumatism, lumbago, nervous diseases and as a demulcent in arthritis and in dropsy.

Asparagaceae Fruit
The fruits are used in the treatment of malarial and kill intestinal worms.

Duranta repens Verbenaceae Leaf and fruit
The roots are stimulant for indolent ulcer. Different parts of the carrot have been used in medicine for the treatment of kidney dysfunction, asthma, dropsy, inflammation, leprosy etc.

46.
Damascus carota Apiaceae Leaf and latex The latex is used as a pain reliever, antibacterial agent, emetic and remedies for skin warts and toothache.

Euphorbia Euphorbiaceae Leaf and bark
Decoction of the bracts and flowers are taken as galactagogue by nursing women to increase milk flow. The leaves are applied as poultice and used as emeto cathartic causing vomiting and bowel movement. Although, the proportion of species used for different purposes vary, in general traditional home gardens contribute sustainably towards meeting the basic subsistence needs of their owners for product and services such as food including vegetables and fruits, medicines, forage, shade and ornamental (Alburquerque et al., 2003). Presently many home gardens show a shift from subsistence oriented agriculture to market (Peyre et al., 2006).

Ficus benghalensis
The study concludes that the home garden ensure crop diversification, provide diversified products though low in amount but nutritious in nature, conserve plant genetic resources and evolutionary processes in the Coimbatore city.