Plants of Darjeeling and Jalpaiguri Forests

It is an endeavour to prepare as far as practicable, a full checklist of vegetation of the districts of Jalpaiguri and Darjeeling of West Bengal. It has been a very strenuous job as the areas virtually represents job as the area virtually represents floral and faunal diversity of the entire country with having 1/255 the part of the forest area of India, the area abounds with 1/3rds of the floral diversity of the country. The vegetation is so rich that even mere listing them covers about a thousand pages. So far no flora of the districts has been compiled but for Cowan brothers’ one publication (1929). Few taxonomists have listed grasses, sedges, ferns and monocots of the districts. The author has endeavoured to present a reliable checklist of flora of the districts for which he consulted the herbarium specimens, Darjeeling besides the publications of Dr. Yonzo, Dr. Sikdar, Dr. Banerjee and the author’s own publications. The author’s effort extends in presentation of a few eco-biological features of grasses, climbers, epiphytes, fern and fern allies and other species. This treatise should be considered very useful as a guide book for field studies by the foresters and botanists. But for D.D. Sarkar’s arduous effort in compiling and editing the entire manuscript, guiding the computer operator in preparation of the same and related computerised activities and printing the sub-titles at different pages of the book would not have assumed the present form. Thanks to his untiring and sincere endeavour.