ABOUT MADHYA PRADESH

The state of Madhya Pradesh is located on the biogeographic zone of the deccan plateau of peninsula India. It is no doubt bestowed with a variety of habitats and ecotones and is arbitrarily divided into malwa ,bulndelkhand, baghelkhand, vindhyan and central Indian plateues. They are derained by major rivers like the tapti, sone, narmada, and Chambal .Some of Indians finest forests and vast wilderness araes are encountered in the state in the form of thorn forests. Shurbs-lands, deciduous forest, bamboo stands ,wetlands habitats and few refugial remnants of once continuous evergreen forests.

About 36% of India bird species are recorded in the state and as many as 15 avian Indian endemic including one deccan peninsular endemic, as well as 24 threatened bird species, thrive here. The wildlife in the region is protected in 2 biosphere reserve, 9 National parks, 5 Tiger reserve, 25 wildlife sanctuaries 19 IBA’s and 1 Ramsar site.

Forests:
The forest are spread over 95,221.13 sq km, agriculture land over 20,26,598 hectares and irrigated area cover over 53,66,400 hectres.30.9% of the state geographical areas was recorded as forest area in 1994 as per the forest department recorded, while 25.1% of the state area and 11.4% of India’s forest cover were reported from Madhya Pradesh in 2001(MOEF, 2001). forests are classified as Sub-tropical broad leaved hills forests, Tropical moist deciduous forest(50%) Tropical dry deciduous forest (49.7%), Tropical thorn forest (0.14%) and wetlands.

Wetlands:
Ministry of Environment and forest, GOI has identified a few wetlands for conservation, particularly Barna Reservoir, Yashwant sagar, Ken river wetlands, National Chambal Sanctuary, Ghatigaon, Ratapani, Denwa –Tawa wetlands, Kanha tiger reserve, Sakhya sagar, Dihalia and Govindsagar. Other have proposed Gandhisagar Dam (Mandsaur), Govindhgarh (Rewa), Halali lake (Bhopal) for declaration as Ramsar sites. 7 wetlands dependent globally threatened species are listed from the state.

Avifauna of Madhya Pradesh:
469 species of birds are listed from Madhya Pradesh by Grimmet and Inskipp, 2003, while 488 species and sub species are reported from the state by K. Chandra, 2006.