THE ASSESSMENT OF HOME GARDENS PLANT SPECIES DIVERSITY, COMPOSITION AND THEIR USE TYPES IN FOFA WOREDA,YEM ZONE, CENTRA ETHIOPIA REGION, ETHIOPIA

Abstract

The study was conducted in fofa warada of yem Zone in central Ethiopia region. It was located at north wast of the Zone and 189km far from Addis Ababa. Study was carried out from February 2015-december 2016. For sit selection purposive sampling technique was used. Home garden is defined as a serious land use system involving the purposeful management of multipurpose trees and shrubs and herbs grown in close association of house. Herbaceous species were diverse and greater in number. Data was gathered by using botanical survey methods. The aim of this study was to investigate the diversity of homgarden plant species and their use values. Frome 15 kebele two kebeles with different altitude were selected purposively, but there was not practice of home garden at low land agro ecology. 304 informants were selected for data collection from both kebele. Home garden plant were identified by online plant scientific checking system, previously done research works and by using taxonomic keys of ‘Flora of Ethiopia and Eritrea. In both kebele of study area (Gessi (midland and top Kesheli (high land) 67 plant species were distributed in to 59 genera and 34 families. Microsoft excell was used to manage data. Data was summarized by descriptive statistics. Preference ranking, direct matrix ranking, Sorenson’s diversity index were ethno botanical data analysis methods. Poaceae family were predominant in number of species (6 species). Other17 families of eachcontaines only one species. Enset ventricosum was the dominant plant species in study area while Rosa hybrid and Ricinus communist were the least plant species in tope kesheli and Gessi kebele respectively. The diversity index values (H’) for Gessi was 3.55 and 3.348 for Top keshele respectively. The Simpson’s diversity index of Gessi was 0.96112 and for kesheli was 0.9540. The evenness index of the species in the two study area were nearly similar (E = 0.8603 for Gessi and E=0.8746 for Top keshele) .Sorenson`s Index of similarity (Ss) in both kebele was 0.74(74%), implies that the overall similarity of species in both kebele. 62 species were found at Gessi and 46 species were found at Top keshele. Interms of habit largest in number were herbs and the least in number were climbers. To identify bioactive chemicals it would be more useful if quantitative phytochemical screening tests carried out.