Floral diversity and ethnobotanical profile of Anwar-Mahal, District Charsadda, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan

Abstract

To organize floral diversity and explore the ethnobotanical knowledge of Anwar-Mahal Village, District Charsadda, Pakistan, the plants were collected and documented. The indigenous knowledge about plant use was obtained from the local community, and selected plant species were analyzed for their nutritional profile. Plants were collected during field visits to the study area and were identified with the help of available literature. For ethnobotanical data collection, the questionnaire method was adopted, and Informants were randomly selected from different age groups. The artifact method (ex-situ sampling) and the inventory method (in-situ sampling) were used for the same. Elemental analysis of the selected species was performed at the Centralized Resource Laboratory, University of Peshawar, Pakistan, and proximate analysis was done at the Nuclear Institute for Food and Agriculture (NIFA), Peshawar, including moisture content, ash analysis, fibers, carbohydrates, and protein. The floral diversity of the area consists of 166 species distributed in 120 genera and 47 families. Four families were monocots with 9 genera and 23 (13.86%) species, and 43 families were dicots with 111 genera and 143 (86.14%) species. Poaceae was the leading family with 17 (10.24%) species, followed by Asteraceae with 16 (9.63%) species. The number of herbs was 119 (71.69%), trees 26 (15.66%), and shrubs 21 (12.65%) species. Therophyte was the dominant life form, having 84 (50.29%) species, and microphyll with 62 (36.68%) species was the leading leaf size class. Of different species recorded, 75 (34%) were medicinal, 35 (16%) fodder, 30 (14%) fuel, 20 (09%) vegetable, 17 (08%) fruit, 13 (06%) timber, 12 (05%) ornamental, 9 (04%) condiments, 7 (03%) beverages, and 3 (1.4%) poisonous. Elements like Mg, Ca, K, Na, Cu, Fe, Mn, and Zn were found to be in varying quantities in the selected plant species.