Abstract

The current study is mainly focused on the notified forest areas within the Kamrup Metropolitan district of Assam, India. Satellite imagery of January, 2014 has been used to assess the forest cover and wildlife habitat in the study area. Nine landscape elements have been identified within the notified forest areas. The study shows that, in most of the notified forest areas, moist mixed deciduous forest dense and open categories are available. Out of the total geographical area of all the notified forest areas, 17.53% is covered with moist mixed deciduous forest dense category. The moist mixed deciduous forest open forest covers 27.75% area of the total geographical area of notified forest. Motapahar Reserve Forest (R.F), Garbhanga R.F., Rani R.F., Apricola East and West R.F. are still have good quality forest cover and wildlife habitat. But there are some areas like Sarania R.F., South Kalapahar R.F., Fatasil R.F., etc which are under severe threat from the human activities and need immediate attention to conserve existing forests and restore degraded forest areas. This study also recommends some measures to conserve and protect the forest resources and wildlife habitat in the Kamrup Metropolitan district.