Medicinal and Aromatic Plant Diversity of Himalayan Cold Desert with Reference to Spiti Valley of North-west Himalayas

Abstract

A number of floristic surveys were conducted in different localities of cold desert in Spiti valley of North-West Himalayas for documenting the medicinal and aromatic plant diversity. A total of 118 medicinal and aromatic plant species have been recorded, which were low in occurrence and sparsely distributed. They were also under threat mainly due to over exploitation, unscientific collection and overgrazing.