PLATINUM The Journal of Threatened Taxa (JoTT) is dedicated to building evidence for conservaton globally by publishing peer-reviewed artcles OPEN ACCESS online every month at a reasonably rapid rate at www.threatenedtaxa.org. All artcles published in JoTT are registered under Creatve Commons Atributon 4.0 Internatonal License unless otherwise mentoned. JoTT allows unrestricted use, reproducton, and distributon of artcles in any medium by providing adequate credit to the author(s) and the source of publicaton. Journal of Threatened Taxa Building evidence for conservaton globally www.threatenedtaxa.org ISSN 0974-7907 (Online) | ISSN 0974-7893 (Print) Communication Herpetofauna assemblage in two watershed areas of Kumoan Himalaya, Uttarakhand, India Kaleem Ahmed & Jamal A. Khan 26 February 2021 | Vol. 13 | No. 2 | Pages: 17684–17692 DOI: 10.11609/jot.5587.13.2.17684-17692 For Focus, Scope, Aims, Policies, and Guidelines visit htps://threatenedtaxa.org/index.php/JoTT/about/editorialPolicies#custom-0 For Artcle Submission Guidelines, visit htps://threatenedtaxa.org/index.php/JoTT/about/submissions#onlineSubmissions For Policies against Scientfc Misconduct, visit htps://threatenedtaxa.org/index.php/JoTT/about/editorialPolicies#custom-2 For reprints, contact <[email protected]> The opinions expressed by the authors do not refect the views of the Journal of Threatened Taxa, Wildlife Informaton Liaison Development Society, Zoo Outreach Organizaton, or any of the partners. The journal, the publisher, the host, and the part- Publisher & Host ners are not responsible for the accuracy of the politcal boundaries shown in the maps by the authors. Member Threatened Taxa Journal of Threatened Taxa | www.threatenedtaxa.org | 26 February 2021 | 13(2): 17684–17692 ISSN 0974-7907 (Online) | ISSN 0974-7893 (Print) PLATINUM OPEN ACCESS htps://doi.org/10.11609/jot.5587.13.2.17684-17692 #5587 | Received 26 November 2019 | Final received 04 December 2020 | Finally accepted 12 February 2021 COMMUNICATION Herpetofauna assemblage in two watershed areas of Kumoan Himalaya, Utarakhand, India Kaleem Ahmed 1 & Jamal A. Khan 2 1,2 Conservaton Ecology Research Group, Conservaton Monitoring Centre, Department of Wildlife Sciences, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, Utar Pradesh 202002, India. 1 [email protected] (corresponding author), 2 [email protected] Abstract: We surveyed herpetofauna along the poorly-explored region of two watersheds of Kumoan Himalaya, Dabka and Khulgarh. Adaptve cluster method was used to collect forest foor reptles, and stream transect was used for stream reptles and amphibians. In total, 18 species of reptles were recorded in two watersheds, with 15 and nine species recorded in Dabka and Khulgarh, respectvely. Forest foor density of reptles was 87.5/ha in Dabka and 77.7/ha in Khulgarh. In terms of species, Asymblepharus ladacensis and Lygosoma punctatus density were highest in Dabka and Khulgarh, respectvely. Eight species of amphibians were recorded in Dabka with a density of 9.4/ha and four species in Khulgarh with density of 5.2/ha. In both watersheds, density of Euphlycts cyanophlycts was highest. Reptlian and amphibian diversity of Dabka was 1.52 and 1.23, respectvely, and in Khulgarh 0.43 and 0.23, respectvely. In both watersheds reptle density, diversity and richness decreased with increasing elevaton. Reptle density showed a weak correlaton with microhabitat features such as liter cover, liter depth, and soil moisture in both watersheds. Amphibian density was positvely correlated with soil moisture, liter cover, and liter depth. Comparison showed that Dabka is richer and more diverse than Khulgarh, presumably because of the undisturbed habitat, broad and slow stream, and deeper forest liter of the former. Keywords: Amphibians, Dabka, Khulgarh, microhabitat, reptles, watersheds, western Himalaya. Editor: Raju Vyas, Vadodara, Gujarat, India. Date of publicaton: 26 February 2021 (online & print) Citaton: Ahmed, K. & J.A. Khan (2021). Herpetofauna assemblage in two watershed areas of Kumoan Himalaya, Utarakhand, India. Journal of Threatened Taxa 13(2): 17684–17692. htps://doi.org/10.11609/jot.5587.13.2.17684-17692 Copyright: © Ahmed & Khan 2021. Creatve Commons Atributon 4.0 Internatonal License. JoTT allows unrestricted use, reproducton, and distributon of this artcle in any medium by providing adequate credit to the author(s) and the source of publicaton. Funding: Department of Science and Technology (DST), NRDMS Division, Government of India. Competng interests: The authors declare no competng interests. Author details: Dr. Kaleem Ahmed is working as Assistant Professor in the Department of Wildlife Sciences, AMU, Aligarh and engaged in the feld of wildlife research from last ten years. Dr. Jamal A. Khan is a renowned Wildlife Scientst, Professor and Chairman of Department of Wildlife Sciences, AMU, Aligarh. Author contributon: The data collecton, analysis and writng was done by KA under the guidance of JAK. JAK is also the PI of the project under which the present study was conducted. Acknowledgements: We thank the Department of Science and Technology (DST), NRDMS Division, Government of India for funding this study under the project “Documentng patern of faunal diversity in Dabka and Khulgarh watershed areas of Kumoan Himalayas Utarakhand, India”. We are thankful to feld assistants of the study sites for their excellent help in data collecton. We also thank two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments in improving the manuscript. 17684 Herpetofauna of two Kumaon Himalayan watersheds Ahmed & Khan J TT INTRODUCTION assess current biodiversity and abundance scientfcally, but also to estmate them in the future, which will aid Amphibians and reptles play integral roles in food efcient conservaton. webs as herbivores, predators and prey, and they also connect aquatc and terrestrial ecosystems (Schenider STUDY AREA et al. 2001; Ahmed 2010). Unlike birds and mammals, herpetofauna in India have not been studied in detail The Khulgarh Watershed Area (KWA) lies between (Vasudevan et al. 2001), with most studies restricted 29.575—29.683 0N and 79.537—79.616 0E in Almora to the rainforests of the Western Ghats (Myers 1942; District of Kumaon Himalaya, Utarakhand, northern Inger et al. 1984; Vasudevan et al. 2006; Naniwadekar India (Fig. 1). The area spreads over 32km2 and & Vasedevan 2007; Chandramouli & Ganesh 2010; represents middle Shiwaliks. It is situated 15km west of Venugopal 2010; Murali & Raman 2012; Balaji et al. Almora Town and encompasses 34 villages. There are 2014; Bhupathy et al. 2016; Garg & Biju 2017; Chaitanya three distnct seasons: summer, winter, and monsoon. et al. 2018; Ganesh et al. 2018; Harikrishnan et al. 2018; The average annual temperature of the watershed is Malik et al. 2019; Ganesh & Achyuthan 2020) and 20ºC and the elevaton of the area ranges 1,100–2,200 northeastern India (Ahmed et al. 2009; Das et al. 2009; m. The most dominatng tree species in the study area Chhetri et al. 2010; Purkayastha et al. 2011; Pan et al. was Pinus roxburghii both in forested and outside forest 2013; Vogel & Ganesh 2013; Roy et al. 2018). Sporadic areas. Other dominant tree species found in the area studies have described or recorded new species for the were Quercus incana and Lyonia ovalifolia. western Himalaya (Murthy & Sharma 1976; Saikia et al. Dabka Watershed Area (DWA) has an area of about 2007; Negi & Banyal 2016; Santra et al. 2019). 69.06km2 and lies between 29.505–29.402 0N and Gibbons et al. (2000) enumerated six causes of global 79.298–79.427 0E in the region of lesser Himalaya in the decline in herpetofauna: habitat loss and degradaton, state of Utarakhand (Ahmed 2010) (Fig. 1). The climate introduced invasive species, environmental polluton, of the area is cold and temperate with temperate disease and parasitsm, unsustainable use, and global vegetaton. The monsoon starts at the end of June and climate change. These causes are present in India ceases by the middle of September. This area falls in where conservaton strategies are mostly based on diferent alttudinal ranges of 500–2,600 m. In the lower glamorous taxa such as birds and mammals, and thus elevatons of 600–900 m near Kotabagh, the mean annual may neglect smaller and less conspicuous vertebrates temperature varies from 18.9ºC to 21.1ºC with a mean such as amphibians and reptles (Vasudevan et al. 2006). annual rainfall of 2,860.3mm. In the warm temperate The inclusion of smaller vertebrates in management zone of 900–1,800 m, the mean annual temperature plans for any partcular region is necessary for the varies from 13.9 to 18.9ºC with mean annual rainfall overall conservaton of biodiversity at local as well as of 3,623.33mm. In the cold temperate zone of 1,800– landscape-level (Pawar et al. 2007). Informaton on 2,500 m, the mean annual temperature varies from 10.3 the herpetofauna species constellaton appears to be to 13.9ºC with an annual rainfall of 1,750mm. DWA is largely neglected regionally. Moreover, the informaton a reserve forest, which is divided into forest ranges, available mostly restricted to some protected areas, Vinayak and Naina. Most of the study area was located and there is a need to study amphibians and reptles, under Vinayak forest range of Kumaon division with partcularly at watersheds, which are ecological islands dominatng Quercus leucotricophora, and a few patches of these species. of Pinus roxburgii, Taxus baccata, and Cedrus deodara In the present study, we present and discuss the trees are also present. Rhododendron arborium trees species compositon and abundance of the herpetofauna are common throughout the area because both KWA of the two watershed areas in northern India. The paper and DWA were present in similar ecological conditons investgates species diversity and abundance of reptles and KWA has more disturbed habitat than DWA (Ahmed and amphibians in watersheds on mountains in northern 2010), so, we compared them based on their elevaton India. For the frst tme ecological and distributonal patern and disturbance factor. data are provided for the herpetofauna of Kumoan Himalaya, partcularly the watersheds.