INTRODUCTION :
Humans evolved from ancestral apes and
our genes are still reflecting of our vegetation
and small animal eating past. Evolved in Africa
and then Asia, we ate a huge range of leaves,
buds, flowers, stems, gums, roots, tubers, fruits
and even pollen before we learned agriculture.1
During agriculture evolution some preferred
plants were selected for cultivation, while use of
several wild edibles continued even today after
thousands of years. During the survey of North
Maharashtra for documentation of wild edible
food plants; 149 plants were noted to be edible.
Different plant parts such as roots (5), tubers
(11), tender shoots (5), leaves (65), flowers (35),
fruits (48), seeds (16) and gum(6)were found to
be exploited as edible. Present paper deals with
the documentation of wild edible gum yielding
plants of north Maharashtra.
Utilization of gum has a long tradition and it
is one of the important health care non-timber
forest products for tribal and rural communities.
Plants produce gum naturally or when they get
wounded by external factors. Gummosis is the
process through which gums are formed in plants.
Being important commodity humans have not
only employed gums for ceremonial, esthetic and
therapeutic uses but also in arts and industry, as
a result they have been traded as the most sought
material between the different cultures around
the world from the earliest times8.
MATERIAL AND METHODS :
Documentation of wild edible plants was
carried out during January 2007 – November
- Total 184 locals were interviewed, of
which 10 provided the information about edible
gum yielding plants. The area selected for survey
includes rural as well as tribal areas. Fortnightly;
sometimes, weekly tours were organized for
visiting the locals of the region. Field trips were
made with the locals to observe the wild edibles
in nature. Locals were interviewed in most formal
way. Also market survey was done to know the
economic potential of these gums. Information
like the name (common/vernacular/ local name)
of wild plant and the mode of use was noted down
on questioner. Species were identified using
standard state floras12,13. Herbarium specimens
were prepared and deposited in Department of
Botany Govt. Vidarbha Institute of Science and
Humanities, Amravati. Standard nomenclature
was followed from plantlist15