Background The study aimed at documenting the indigenous and local knowledge and use of traditional medicinal plants for treating human and livestock ailments in Dawuro Zone of Ethiopia. Methods A survey was conducted among traditional healers and native administrators through discussion, interviews, and field observations. The snowball sampling technique was used to select 384 traditional healers in purposefully selected 50 villages spanning seven districts for face-to-face individual interviews. The chi-square test was applied to establish associations between traditional healers’ demographics, the distance between the village site and the nearest natural forest and a health center, and SPSS V.20 software was used for the analysis. Results The traditional healers of the study area reported the use of 274 traditional medicinal plant species belonging to 217 genera and 82 families. Asteraceae (11.68%), Fabaceae (9.49%), and Lamiaceae (9.12%) were the foremost frequently used families. Herb species (54.8%) and leaves (65%) were predominantly sourced from the wild environment. The quantity of medicinal plants used (x2 = 278.368, df = 20, P = 0.000) and years of (experience in) traditional healing using herbs (x2 = 76.358, df = 10, P = 0.000) varied with distance from the natural forests. The service charge for healing had strong positive association (x2 = 24.349, df = 5, P = 0.000) with healer’s age (x2 = 309.119, df = 184, P = 0.000) and educational level (x2 = 851.230, df = 598, P = 0.000) with distance of traditional healer's residence from the medical institution. The agricultural activities, urbanization, low or no charge for the healing service, the secrecy and oral transfer of the knowledge, and the demand for medicinal and other multiple purposes species were some of the factors threatening the resource and the associated knowledge as well as the service in the study area. Conclusion There are diversified traditional medicinal plants applied for healthcare of the community and domestic animals of the study area. The source of remedies mostly depends on herbs of natural forests, and the leaf was the most frequently used plant part. Developing conservation intervention and sustainable systems of utilization is needed for multipurpose medicinal plants. Finally, integrating with modern system and formalizing, legalizing, and capacitating the traditional medicine practitioners are needed for access of primary healthcare systems to rural communities.

Background: Over centuries, indigenous people have developed their own locality specific knowledge on plant use, management and conservation. However, this valuable traditional knowledge on utilization of plants was not much documented and hence, most of the indigenous knowledge acquired by the local people has been passed on from generation to generation by the word of mouth. Ethnobotanical study is of the use and maintenance of traditional medicinal plant species by the people of Aleta Chuko woreda, South Ethiopia. The study made an attempt to assess the indigenous knowledge that equips the community to identify the medicinal plants, formulate the medicines and subsequently administer the curatives used to treat various human and livestock diseases as the threats that could affect their sustainable use. Methods: A total of 100 informants (85 males and 15 females) were selected to collect information on medicinal plant use from five selected kebeles by using non-probability sampling method. Relevant ethnobotanical information was collected through semi-structured interview, field observation and group discussion. Data was analyzed using descriptive statistics and simple linear correlation coefficient. The study was carried out from September, 2017 to July, 2018. Results A total of 53 medicinal plant species representing 49 genera and 30 plant families used in the treatment of 92 (81 human and 11 livestock) different ailments. The plant families Lamiaceae, Rutaceae, and Asteraceae were the most dominant groups. Out of the total recorded medicinal plant species, 79%, 11 % and 10%, were used for treating human, livestock and both humans and livestock health problems respectively. Stomachache and cough were the most common health problems of the study area affecting both humans and animals. 60% of the medicinal plant species were collected from the wild/forest and the remaining 40%were collected from the Homegardens. Herbs were the dominant medicinal plant habit, followed by shrubs and trees. Leaves are the dominant plant part used in formulating curative preparations. The most dominant methods of preparation were crushing and pounding and 70.5% is the dominant route of oral administration. Fagaropsis angolensis was the most effective curatives species against stomach ache, the most common human disease in the study area, followed by Leonotis nepetifolia, and Ajuga integrifolia, Ocimum lamiifolium was the most preferred medicinal plant to treat headache followed by Echinops kebericho and Salvia nilotica. Conclusions: The Coffee-Enset based home gardens which characterize the study area make a substantial contribution to the conservation of medicinal plants species. In order to conserve the traditional medicinal plant species of the study area, community-based in-situ and ex-situ conservation actions, awareness creation in the younger members, and strengthening home gardens and other components of the agro-forestry systems to be used as repositories of medicinal plant species and alternative conservation sites are re...

Background Plant-based mosquito control methods may use as a supplementary malaria vector control strategy. This study aimed to evaluate the effect of smoking ethno-medicinal plants on indoor density and feeding activity of malaria vectors at early hours of the night and its residual effect after midnight in southern Ethiopia. Methods Both field and tent trials were conducted to evaluate the impact of smoking Juniperus procera leaves, Eucalyptus globulus seeds and Olea europaea leaves in Kolla Shara Village from July 2016 to February 2017. For the field trial, five grass-thatched traditional huts (three for ethno-medicinal plants and two as control [only charcoal smoking and non-charcoal smoking]) were used. Indoor host-seeking mosquitoes were collected by CDC light traps. A Latin square design was employed to minimize the bias due to the variation in house location and different sampling nights. For the tent experiment, 25 3–5-day-old starved wild female Anopheles mosquitoes reared from the larvae were released into the tents where a calf was tethered at the mid-point of each tent. Results A total of 614 Anopheles mosquitoes belonging to 5 species were collected from 5 huts, of which 93.4% was An. arabiensis; O. europaea, E. globulus and J. procera reduced the indoor density of An. arabiensis, with the mean percentage drop of 80%, 73% and 70%, respectively. In the tent trial, smoking of these plants had significant knockdown effects and inhibited feeding on the calves (F = 383.5, DF = 3, P < 0.01). The mean knockdown effect due to O. europaea was relatively high (17.7 ± 0.54; 95% CI 16.8–18.6), while it was only 0.9 ± 0.1 (95% CI 0.29–1.52) in the control tents. All the test plants used in the tent trial caused significantly inhibited feeding activity of An. arabiensis on the host (F = 383.5, DF = 3, P < 0.01). About 94.5%, 89.5% and 86% of mosquitoes were unfed because of the smoking effect of O. europaea, E. globulus and J. procera, respectively, whereas only 19.5% were unfed in the control tent. Conclusions Smoking ethno-medicinal plant materials reduced indoor density of malaria vectors and inhibited feeding on calves inside the tents. Thus, plant-based mosquito control methods may play a vital role in reducing mosquito bites in the early hours of the night and thereby reduce residual malaria transmission.

Smallholder farmers grow diverse crop landraces in their fields which contribute to the capacities of agricultural systems to adapt to environmental changes through maintaining broad genetic variations of crops, and there by allowing evolution of crops to continue. This study, therefore, was conducted on yam landrace diversity and distribution in two districts in South West Ethiopia, namely Basketo and Deramalo districts of which eight yam growing communities (four from each district) were included with the purpose of finding out the diversity and distribution of yam farmers’ landraces on cultivation in the study area. 248 yam farmer informants were selected for collecting data through semi-structured interviews, focus group discussions, and yam landrace count on the bases of field observations. A total of 25 yam varieties were recorded with a mean of 8 at a household level. Invariably in the eight study communities, most of the varieties were cultivated in small areas by few households, depicting serious genetic erosion of yams in the communities. There was also a significant difference among the study sites in the mean yam landrace richness and diversity at 95% level of significance (p<0.05). In addition, the study showed that there is a trend of gradual withdrawal of the cultivation of some yam landraces due to various reasons. Hence, interventions that align individuals’ and society’s interests to maintain the viability of on-farmconservation of yam landraces may be needed.

This study was conducted, with the aim of investigating the diversity, distribution variations and major factors that influence the abundance of Enset landraces in the Amaro special district, southern Ethiopia. Both qualitative and quantitative techniques were employed to collect data in two phases. The sampled territory covered main Enset growing agro-ecological zones (1400 to 3121 masl) of Amaro district. A total of 78 households from sixfarmers administration (FAs) were selected following systematic random sampling method. The FAs were selected based on the amount and extent of Enset and the agro-ecological variations. The study area was stratified into highland (2001 – 3000 masl), midland (1400– 2000 masl) and lowland (<1400 masl). The data were analyzed using descriptive statistical procedures. SPSS Ver. 20 was used to analyse the data. Landrace richness, diversity, and dominance per farm were calculated using PAST software. One-way ANOVA was used to make a test of significance in mean enset landrace richness among households and studied FAs. Shannon diversity index (H') was used to measure diversity of landraces and Shannon‟s equitability (EH) was also used to measure the equity of diversity of landraces through finding the ratios of observed diversity to maximum diversity. A total of 40 named landraces was recorded. However, the landrace diversity was not evenly distributed throughout the district. The highest diversity was being recorded in highland FAs. The results revealed that farmers exchange planting materials extensively resulting in a fairly high variation in the diversityof Enset landraces among the selected FAs. Diversity, distribution, and evenness of the different landraces of Enset varied among the study sites (P < 0.05). These variations largely depended on the age of the household heads, altitude, agro-ecology, precipitation, availability of sucker, status of managementand presence of organic fertilizer (animal dung). The Enset bacterial wilt disease was also one of the main factors limiting Enset richnessand diversity. Further research is required to know and exhaustively document the landracesand also to reduce the growing effects of Enset bacterial wilt.