Join Us & Make a Difference
Our Initiatives save critically endangered wildlife from habitat loss
Biodiversity Research and Conservation Society is a non-governmental organization that has been in existence since 2017, and officially registered in 2019. BRCS started up as a humble organization in Munnar involved in conducting a number of initiatives such as river cleans ups, talks in schools & colleges and an active promoter sustainable ecotourism practices in the region.
The society has metamorphosized into a body which focuses on large-scale landscape conservation issues in the High Ranges of Idukki. In Munnar, BRCS has taken up the challenge of implementing a waste management project, in conjunction with the RDO, Devikulam and Munnar Grama Panchayat. The society also pursues ecological research in the areas of land use management and road side ecology in the high range landscape and is actively collaborating with the Kerala Forest & Wildlife Departments in the execution of conservation strategies for the preservation of endemic flora and fauna.
OUR STUDY AREA
Our Sphere Of Influence
The high ranges of Idukki lie within the Nilgiri Biosphere, and has been designated an ecofragile zone in both the Gadgil and Kasturirangan reports. His Unique habitats of Shola-grasslands mosaics occur only in the Southern Western Ghats above 1400 m a.s.l. and contain within themselves a large proportion of endemism with respect to both flora and fauna and are vital for lowland riverine ecology. Carbon isotope and palynological evidence has shown that these mosaic ecosystems have been in existence for 30 to 40 thousand years, even before the advent of human kind. The trees of the Shola forests are slow-growing with a large proportion of the trees at least a few hundred years old.
The Shola forests act as a catalyst for rainfall due to the dense canopy causing a high transpiration rate.The montane grasslands of the shola mosaic complex are highly fragmented and with the push to increase plantations post 1990s grasslands are more affected than the forests. The shrinking of grasslands has caused immense pressure on habitat specialists such as the Nilgiri Pipit (Anthusnilghiriensis) and NilgiriTahr (Nilgiritragushylocrius).These unique sky islands that are home to rare and endemic flora and fauna, have been, and continue to be under a lot of pressure from both natural and anthropogenic factors. Fifty per cent of the Sholas have been wiped out since 1850 due to disparate reasons and the grasslands continue to remains the most threatened ecoscape in the region.
