AN INVESTIGATION ON THE PARK AND PEOPLE PROBLEMS: SPECIAL EMPHASIS ON THE IMPACT ON WETLAND SURROUNDING VEGETATION DUE TO OVERGRAZING OF LIVESTOCK IN KOSHI TAPPU WILDLIFE RESERVE, NEPAL. (A Case Study of Kusaha VDC)

Koshi Tappu Wildlife Reserve (KTWR) is an important wetland area in the floodplain of Sapta Koshi River in the east terai of Nepal. It covers about 150 km2 area. It is decorated by a total of 515 species of plants consisting submerged, floating species as well as grassland/subannah and riverine forest. The study was carried out to investigate the impact of overgrazing by livestock on the wetlands surrounding vegetation characteristics of KTWR. Surrounding areas of two wetlands, one from inside the reserve named as ‘Station Wetland ’ (SW site) and other, in the buffer zone, out side the reserve named as ‘Khanta Wetland ’ (KW site) were selected for the study. Station wetland was considered as reference site where there was minimum grazing, whereas, the Khanta wetland was an overgrazed site. Vegetation study was done using 50 x 50 cm quadrate. In each site 10 quadrates were thrown randomly. Species density and abundance of the vegetation were compared from both the sites. 23 species of vegetation are recorded at KW site where as 17 species were recorded SW site. Species density of KW site was 10.7 and that of SW site was 17.5. Common flora