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    Importance of Wilpattu National Park On Conservation of Dry Zone Animal and Plant Species in Sri Lanka

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    Advance level Biology
    Wilpattu National Park is the largest national park in Sri Lanka, located in the dry zone along the northwest coast. It contains diverse habitats that are home to many plant and animal species, including 605 plant species, 118 of which are endemic. The park protects medicinal plants, crop wild relatives, food plants, dry zone timber species, and threatened and endemic plants. It is also habitat for 284 faunal species, including 21 endemic and 30 threatened species. Key animal species include the vulnerable Sri Lankan leopard, highly threatened Sri Lankan sloth bear, spotted deer, jackal, sambar deer, and various bird species. The park plays an important role in conserving dry zone species

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    Importance of Wilpattu National Park On Conservation of Dry Zone Animal and Plant Species in Sri Lanka

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    Advance level Biology
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    Wilpattu National Park is the largest national park in Sri Lanka, located in the dry zone along the northwest coast. It contains diverse habitats that are home to many plant and animal species, including 605 plant species, 118 of which are endemic. The park protects medicinal plants, crop wild relatives, food plants, dry zone timber species, and threatened and endemic plants. It is also habitat for 284 faunal species, including 21 endemic and 30 threatened species. Key animal species include the vulnerable Sri Lankan leopard, highly threatened Sri Lankan sloth bear, spotted deer, jackal, sambar deer, and various bird species. The park plays an important role in conserving dry zone species

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    IMPORTANCE OF WILPATTU NATIONAL PARK ON CONSERVATION OF DRY ZONE ANIMAL AND PLANT SPECIES IN SRI LANKA

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    Wilpattu National Park is the largest national park in Sri Lanka, located in the dry zone along the northwest coast. It contains diverse habitats that are home to many plant and animal species, including 605 plant species, 118 of which are endemic. The park protects medicinal plants, crop wild relatives, food plants, dry zone timber species, and threatened and endemic plants. It is also habitat for 284 faunal species, including 21 endemic and 30 threatened species. Key animal species include the vulnerable Sri Lankan leopard, highly threatened Sri Lankan sloth bear, spotted deer, jackal, sambar deer, and various bird species. The park plays an important role in conserving dry zone species

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    46 views3 pages

    Importance of Wilpattu National Park On Conservation of Dry Zone Animal and Plant Species in Sri Lanka

    Uploaded by

    Advance level Biology
    Wilpattu National Park is the largest national park in Sri Lanka, located in the dry zone along the northwest coast. It contains diverse habitats that are home to many plant and animal species, including 605 plant species, 118 of which are endemic. The park protects medicinal plants, crop wild relatives, food plants, dry zone timber species, and threatened and endemic plants. It is also habitat for 284 faunal species, including 21 endemic and 30 threatened species. Key animal species include the vulnerable Sri Lankan leopard, highly threatened Sri Lankan sloth bear, spotted deer, jackal, sambar deer, and various bird species. The park plays an important role in conserving dry zone species

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    IMPORTANCE OF WILPATTU NATIONAL PARK ON

    CONSERVATION OF DRY ZONE ANIMAL AND PLANT


    SPECIES IN SRI LANKA

    S. Herath
    Introduction
    Wilpattu national park is one of the oldest as well as the largest national park in Sri Lanka. The
    name “Wilpattu” implies Lake District. Its characteristic feature is the presence of many
    “villus” or natural lakes all around the park and Salt water containing Villus within the Wilpattu
    National Park is a unique ecosystem. It is situated in the dry zone along northwest coast of Sri
    Lanka. First declared as a sanctuary in 1905, its conservation status was elevated to that of a
    National Park in 1938. The park also holds a significance for the prehistoric sites found in it;
    like Pomparippu, where prehistoric burial sites have been discovered and also Kudiramale, the
    place where prince Vijaya landed in 543 BC.

    The climate of Wilpattu National park is characterized by inter monsoon rains in March and
    April, an extensive drought from May until early September and a major rainy season (Northern
    Monsoon) from September until December. Mean annual temperature is 27.2 ° C and total
    annual precipitations approximately 1000mm based on long term records (Department of
    wildlife conservation). This dry zone climate facilitates the park in conservation of lots of plant
    and animal species which thrive in the diverse habitats inside the park and also protected under
    the legal protection.

    Plants in Wilpattu national park

    It consist of dry deciduous forests with tall emergent, thorny scrub jungles along with extensive
    grasslands in between. Salt grasses can be observed adjacent to the beaches. According to
    studies it has found that the Wilpattu national park is home to about 605 varieties of plants
    belonging to 118 species were found while 33 of them are endemic to Sri Lanka. Wilpattu
    national park is a remarkable live gene bank for a number of economically and scientifically
    important plants. According to Resource inventory of Wilpattu NP it contains

    Medicinal plants - Asparagus falcatus (Hathawariya), Coccinia grandis (Kowakka), Crinum


    defixum (Goda manel), Eclipta prostrata (Kikiridi)
    Crop wild relatives - Oryza eichingeri & Oryza perrinis (Wildrice)
    Food or fruit plants - Schleichera oleosa (Kon), Syzygium cumini (Madan), Tamarindus
    indica (Siyambala), Walsura trifoliolata (Kiri kon), Ziziphus rugosa (Maha eraminiya)
    Dry zone timber species - Chloroxylon swietenia (Burutha), Diospyros ebenum (Kaluwara),
    Manilkara hexandra (Palu)
    Threatened plants - Adansonia digitata, Salacia reticulata, Scaevola plumieri, Vanilla
    walkerae & Dendrophthoe ligulata,
    Endemic plants- Drypetes gardneri, Mangifera zeylanica, Vernonia zeylanica, Dioscorea
    trimenii, Habenaria dichopetala and Xylopia nigricans.

    Animals in Wilpattu national park

    The Wilpattu national park hosts large mammals such as Elephants, Leopards and Sloth Bears.
    Wilpattu is also a home to various birds, mammals, reptiles, amphibians and fish. A high
    diversity of fauna was found due to the high habitat diversity within the park. According to a
    resource inventory a total of 284 faunal species belonging to 101 families have been recorded,
    among them 21 endemic and 30 nationally threatened species were found. Also the birds have
    been found to be the most abundant vertebrate group (52.10 %) while amphibians have been
    the least abundant (5.94 %).

    Among the mammals found, Sri Lankan leopard is considered one of the most important
    species which also has been listed vulnerable on IUCN red list since 2020. Leopard is also one
    of the main attractions of the place. Wilpattu is also home to Sri Lankan Sloth Bears, which
    are highly threatened with less than 1,000 numbers currently living in the wild. The other
    animals found are spotted deer, jackal, sambar deer, monkey, etc.

    Bird species like Oriental Darter, Egret, Grey Heron, Purple Heron, Woolly-necked Stork, and
    Painted Stork, Whistling Teal, Spoonbill could also be observed.

    Sloth bear Leopard

    References

    1. http://www.dwc.gov.lk/Aoldsite/library/Np_wilpattu.html
    2. Bambaradeniya, Channa & Ekanayake, Sarath & Kekulandala, Bhathiya &
    Goonatilake, Sampath & Perera, Naalin & Perera, Sandun & Wickramasinghe, Mendis
    & Chandana, Asela & Chandranimal, Dilup & Samarawickrama, Prasanna &
    Karunarathna, D.. (2006). Resource Inventory of Wilpattu National Park.

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