A Preliminary Assessment of Ethiopian Sacred Grove Status at the Landscape and Ecosystem Scales.

Abstract

The northern Ethiopian landscape is dotted with small patches of church forests that are religious centers for the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahido Church (EOTC). These sacred groves are what remain of the once vast tropical Afromontane dry forest. Herein we review the landscape pattern of sacred groves in the Amhara region of Ethiopia, and their local scale nutrient status at two sites, Zahara and Debresena. A total of 1,488 sacred groves were inventoried within the study area, yielding an overall density of one sacred grove for every twenty square kilometers. Sacred groves averaged a little over five hectares and were separated from one another by more than two kilometers. At the local scale we found that soil carbon and nitrogen stocks have decreased significantly between the forest interior and the clearing indicating decreased soil fertility. Together our data indicate that these sacred groves are vulnerable to loss because of their small average size, isolation from seed sources, and decreasing soil status

Changes in community perspectives on the roles and rules of church forests in northern Ethiopia: evidence from a panel survey of four Ethiopian Orthodox communities

“…Over the past century firewood demand, agricultural expansion, livestock grazing -compounded by political volatility and insecure land tenure (Hoben 1995;Teka et al 2013) as well as droughts, fires, and climate changehave continued to put pressure on native forests and inhibited natural regeneration (Bongers et al 2006;Alem et al 2010;Nyssen et al 2014). As a result, much of the intact natural forest in Ethiopia's highlands today is restricted to the church forests scattered across the degraded agricultural land (Aerts et al 2006Cardelús et al 2013;Reynolds et al 2015).…”

Population Size and Diet of Bush Hyrax <i>Hetrohyrax brucei</i> (Gray 1868) in the Isolated Romanat Michael Church Forest in Northern Ethiopia, Implication for Conservation

“…In Ethiopian highlands, thousands of fragmented Orthodox Christian Church forests persist as scattered remnants of dry afromontane forests which have been recently converted into open agricultural fields (Wassie et al, 2009(Wassie et al, , 2010Cardelus et al, 2013). Some estimated the presence of about 35,000 church forests in Ethiopia (Bongers et al, 2006), some of which may date back to the fourth century (Wassie et al, 2005(Wassie et al, , 2010.…”

“…In places such as South Gondar Zone (district) of the Amhara Region (province) where church forests are relatively better studied, the presence of 1,404 church forests were reported raging in size from 1.6 to 100 ha (Wassie et al, 2010). The majority of these forests were about 5.2 ha in size (Cardelus et al, 2013).…”

“…The church forests are spiritually-protected by surrounding communities and are often named "biodiversity hotspots" because they harbour a variety of indigenous plants and animals, and members and clergy who use them for firewood, charcoal, making sacred utensils, and grazing domestic animals (Bongers et al, 2006;Wassie et al, 2010;Cardelus et al, 2012Cardelus et al, , 2013. In addition the majority of the church forests are fragmented, highly susceptible to edge effects, and there is a growing concern about their resilience to further perturbations (Wassie et al, 2010;Cardelus et al, 2013).…”

“…In addition the majority of the church forests are fragmented, highly susceptible to edge effects, and there is a growing concern about their resilience to further perturbations (Wassie et al, 2010;Cardelus et al, 2013). In particular, these threats may negatively affect the quality and quantity of resources available for the animals that depend on the forests, restrict their movement, range expansion, population growth, and decrease gene flow between populations (Van Buskirk and Willi, 2006;Verberk, 2011).…”