Abstract—Lake Saif-ul Malook is located in Naran valley of Western Himalay, North Pakistan. The distribution of plant communities and the pattern of species diversity were studied along alpine lake Saif-ul-Mulook. Field analysis of vegetation was carried out by selecting the six sites in order to cover all the geographical variation. Vegetation survey was done by collection data by using five line intercept transects (20 m each) from each site. Results of Two Way Indicator Species Analysis (TWINSPAN) classification have identified three groups of plant communities that were exploited at different levels along the lake. Detrended Correspondence Analysis (DCA) clearly distinguished these groups by the first two DCA axes. Both classification and ordination resulted in a clear demonstration of the vegetation pattern in the study area. Variation in the diversity and the distributional pattern of plant species and communities in the study area may be attributed chiefly to anthropogenic and grazing pressures. The implications of the results are discussed and recommendations are suggested for conservation and sustainable utilization of vegetation.

Index Terms—Alpine vegetation, Lake Saif-ul-Mulook, Twinspan, DCA, Western himalaya.

Zia-ur-Rehman Mashwani and Muhammad Arshad are with the Department of Botany, PMAS arid Agriculture University, Rawalpindi, Pakistan (e-mail: zia.botany@gmail.com, phone: +92-333-9022077).
Mir Ajab Khan and Mushtaq Ahmad are with the Department of Plant Sciences, Quaid-i-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan.
Audil Rashid is with the Department of Environmental Sciences, PMAS Arid Agricultural University, Rawalpindi, Pakistan.

Cite: Zia-ur-Rehman Mashwani, Mir Ajab Khan, Mushtaq Ahmad, Muhammad Arshad, and Audil Rashid, "Vegetation Types in Surrounding Landscape of Alpine Lake Saif-ul-Mulook, Western Himalaya, Pakistan," International Journal of Bioscience, Biochemistry and Bioinformatics vol. 1, no. 4, pp. 244-248, 2011.