Eco Tourism Spots

Punnathur Kotta

Location: 2 km from the Guruvayoor Sree Krishna Temple, Thrissur District.

Visiting hours: 9:30 am to 5:30 pm.

Over forty elephants are groomed at the Punnathur Kotta ( Kotta means 'fort'). Many elephants are brought as ritual offering to the temple. You can spend a whole day with these huge mammals here. Watching the naughty baby elephants' playful antics is an entertaining experience. The place provides you an opportunity to watch how the sick elephants are medically treated in the traditional manner.

One can also watch the training given to the elephants for various ritualistic performances. Remember, you are in the land where people worship the elephantfaced god Lord Ganapathy. Grooming elephants was considered a status symbol. With the decay of the joint family system, supporting elephants became a financial burden for many families. Gradually various temple managements took the charge of looking after these animals. Anyhow, even today elephants play a key role in Kerala's fairs and festivals.

Getting there:

Guruvayoor is about 32 km from Thrissur town.

Nearest railway station: Guruvayoor station is at a walkable distance from the shrine.

Nearest airport: Cochin International Airport, about 58 km from Thrissur town.

Ranipuram

Location: About 85 km from Kasaragod town, Kasaragod district, North Kerala.

Ranipuram is located 750m above sea level on the Western Ghats in Kasaragod district. Covered with evergreen shola woods, monsoon forests and grasslands, this beautiful land is known for its trekking trails. Ranipuram was earlier known as Madathumala and its extensive forests merge into those of Karnataka. Wild elephants can be seen wandering on the mountain tops here.

Tourist cottages provide comfortable stay on the hills. Jeep and bus services are available from Panathady and Kanhangad in Kasaragod town. Ranipuram in its natural beauty is comparable to Ooty a popular hill station in South India.

Getting there

Nearest major railway station: Kasaragod, about 85 km from Ranipuram, on the Kozhikode-Mangalore-Mumbai route.

Nearest airports: Mangalore, about 50 km from Kasaragod; Karipur International Airport, Kozhikode, about 200 km from Kasaragod.

Mangalavanam

Can anyone imagine that in the heart of the bustling city of Emakulam, within a stone throw away from the highrise concrete jungle is a small virgin patch of mangrove vegetation. Lovingly called Mangalavanam, this unique and fragile ecosystem is a breeding place for marine life, small animals and the birds. Thankfully, the Kerala Forest Department has protected it vigilantly.

Not only is it the oxygen bank of the city, it has stood sentinel in the murky waters near the city coast, acting as a filter by trapping pollutants washed down from the land into the bay waters. Mangalavanarn, is at the end of Salim Ali road (named after the famous ornithologist). Today it is increasingly becoming a mustvisit spot for tourists and locals who come to birdwatch. The forest consists of an area of 3 hectares of thick mangrove vegetation along the banks of a water body. This water body is connected to the backwaters and is therefore exposed to tidal flushes.

The forest is rich in the characteristic flora and fauna. There are thousands of birds that make Mangalavanarn their roosting and nesting haven and in a study done last year about 35 species have been identified over here. The ecosystem at Mangalavanarn is intertidal and salt tolerant and it is dominated by its proximity to water.

The mangroves, belonging to the family Rhizophoraceae, share the common ability that they are adapted to flooding and salinity. They constitute a bridge between terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems and the flora and fauna of the area are interdependent.

This fragile system needs extra protection as a break up of any single factor can be disastrous. In Kerala stretches of mangroves are found in the coastal regions of Alapuzha, Ernakulam, Kannur, Kozhikode and Kollam, the common factor being that they grow in places by the quiet ocean water, preferably shallow waters along lagoons and river mouths.

The State has a 590km long coastal line, constituted by a long stretch of backwaters, which consists of a series of lagoons running parallel to the sea. The entry of tidal waters regularly from the sea, the enrichment of 30 estuaries and back waters with a regular supply of fresh water flowing from the perennial rivers create a peculiar ecological environment. It leads to the development of unique mangrove vegetation on the fringes of the backwaters, estuaries and creeks.

According to early reports, there was once a very rich 700 sq. km of mangrove forests here. But at present it has been reduced to dislocated isolated bits that may totally constitute a balance of about 17 sq. km. Major blame for the devastation of mangroves goes to the impact of development and industrialization. There is hope that at least some portions of mangrove forests will be protected for the richness of its biodiversity.

Valuable gene pools exhibiting high level biodiversity, mangrove forests serve as an excellent reservoir of nutrients providing nursery and feeding grounds for a wide array of useful and interesting organisms.