fodder, fuel wood, hedge and shade purposes. Fruit orchards in Nepal are known by
vernacular names, ‘Bagaicha’ in valleys and hills and ‘phulbari’ in the terai region (Shrestha
et al. 2002). In the terai region fruit trees are planted around the home area so that they
provide a good hedge function and also protect people from extreme temperatures during
summer. The present study has recorded a total of 64 different fruit species from across the
sites. However, the hill region has comparatively a higher number of inter-specific diversity of
fruit trees than in terai regions since this region is characterized by a great variation in
topography. Therefore, valleys, streams, river gorges, forests, different slope aspects and
agricultural landscape have created diverse micro-environments in the hills from where
domestication and introduction of fruit trees may have taken place. The most common 20
fruit species in two different agro-ecological zones are given in Table 9. It shows that a
distinct abundance of temperate fruits like Prunus, Pyrus, Citrus are frequently found in the
hill while Mango, Banana, Jack fruits, Papaya are frequently recorded in the terai region.
There are a few types of fruits which have shown a wide distribution across the regions;
such as lemon and peach are recorded from the wider altitudes variation of study sites.
Table 9. Comparative distribution of 20 common fruit species in home gardens of the two
different agro-ecological regions of Nepal
Hill region (Ilam and Gulmi) Terai region (Jhapa and Rupandehi)
Botanical name
Nepali name
Freq
(%)Botanical name
Nepali nameFreq
(%)Prunus persica (^) Aaru 47.22 Mangifera indica Aanp 71.11
Psidium guajava (^) Amba 42.78 Musa spp. Kera 38.33
Musa spp. Kera 37.22 Pachyrhizus erosus Misrikan 30.00
Citrus aurantifolia (^) Kagati 32.22 Citrus spp. Amilo 27.78
Citrus reticulata (^) Suntala 28.33 Psidium guajava Amba 26.67
Carica papaya (^) Mewa 26.67 Carica papaya Mewa 16.11
Pyrus communis (^) Naspati 22.78 Annona squamosa Sarifa 15.56
Prunus
domestica Aalcha 20.56
Ananus comosus
Bhui katahar 11.67
Mangifera indica (^) Aanp 20.00 (^) Suthuni 11.67
(^) Amilo 20.00 Angle marmelos Bel 10.56
Mallus domestica
Apple (?) 11.11
Artocarpus
heterophyllus Rukh katahar 10.56
Prunus
domestica
Aaru
bakhada 9.44
Pithecellobium dulce
Jilebi 6.67
(^) Pustakari 8.33 (^) Kaichi 6.11
Vitis vinifera (^) Angur 7.78 Citrus aurantium Nibuwa 6.11
Citrus limon (^) Jyamir 6.11 Zizyphus jujuba Bayar 5.56
Pyrus pashia (^) Mel 6.11 Citrus reticulata Suntala 5.56
Punica spp. (^) Darim 5.56 Prunus persica Aaru 5.00
Passiflora edulis (^) Lahare aanp 5.00 Phyllanthus emblica Amala 5.00
Citrus sinensis Mausam 5.00 Cicca acida Kansi amala 5.00
Litchi chinensis (^) Litchi 4.44 Spondias cytheria Amaro 4.44
Distribution and use of fodder species
Nepalese home gardens are unique due to integration of fodder trees primarily for livestock
purposes. A total of 62 species of fodder trees were recorded from the surveyed home
gardens. The most common 15 home garden fodder species are given in Table 10. From the
study it was found that terai region is poor in fodder species diversity in comparison to the
hill region. The composition of fodder trees in the two different regions have shown that the
hill region is characterized by the dominance of different species of Ficus while species like
Bakaino (Melia azederach) and Kadam (Anthocephalus cadamba) are dominant in the terai.
In the hills, where fuel wood is scarce, fodder trees are being used as a supplementary to
this. Fodder species like broom grass and bamboo are planted in the home garden to protect