As you stroll down Leh’s main market, you can find an avenue where local sellers sell a wide variety of traditional Ladakhi products. Among these products is wild onion, which is used as a substitute for onions in various Ladakhi dishes and is locally known as skotse. Sonam Tundup, a 75-year-old man from Domkhar village has been selling such traditional products here for almost 30 years. He says, “Once I set up a shop here, people from diverse regions like the wetlands of Nubra and Sham come here and sell wild onions to me. They grind the plant and make small flat cakes so that it is easier to store and use. Since it is sourced from the wild and not available here, these tend to sell out quickly as it has a better taste than onions.”
A wide variety of allium (onion family) species such as Allium przewalskianum and Allium carolinianum grow in the area. “Wetlands are a hub for medicinal plants because of the creation of a microclimate environment that is not found anywhere else. You can find both aquatic plants and land plants in wetlands,” says Konchok Dorjey, an assistant professor in the Department of Botany, Government Degree College, Nubra, University of Ladakh.
Leh, a district of the Union territory of Ladakh, is home to a large number of wetlands and there are 27 prominent wetlands, 24 of which are in the Changthang region, which includes the two Ramsar Sites Tsomoriri and Tsokar. Wetlands cover 3.09 per cent (~ 5.19 lakh ha) of the total geographical area of Ladakh.
Thondup Gyatso, a wildlife ranger in the Wildlife Department, who belongs to the village of Korzok, located on the shores of the Tsomoriri Lake, recalls around 12 edible plants that he knows are consumed by the local communities. This practice of sourcing from the wild is, however, steadily decreasing.
Tashi Norbu was a shepherd for 26 years, and during this time he sourced different plants from the wetlands. He is now 50 years old and runs a homestay cum-restaurant in Thukzhey village near the Tsokar Lake. He remembers his childhood where he and his friends used to collect plants like Himalayan nettle (Urtica hyperborea) and East Himalayan cinquefoil (Potentilla peduncularis, local name: toma) while shepherding around the Tsokar Lake. He says, “After I stopped being a shepherd I have not gone and collected these plants. These days the younger generations go to school and do not collect these plants. I don’t think anyone from our village goes deliberately now to collect these plants. His story resonates with that of 60-year-old Ruth Denyth of Shey village. She remembers how during the spring season when there was scarcity of vegetables, she used to search for toma along the streams in the village. She says, “We used to call it the first vegetable as it is found during spring and used to be our go-to plant. You extract the plant from the soil and get a finger-long root, which is what we used to eat. Usually, we ate it raw and if we found in large amounts we used it in thukpa (hot, Tibetan-style soup). Another edible plant that was found along the water streams in villages is the local plant kumbuk (Carum carvi). Denyth adds, “Kumbuk leaves were used for making a vegetable dish.”
According to Tsewang Rinchen, Research Officer, National Institute of Sowa Rigpa, “Northern nettle is rich in iron and helps in generating heat in the body, which is a necessity during the minus-degree winter months in Ladakh.” Additionally, he also talked about a wild plant found in the wetlands of Puga, locally known as gey-gey (Lloydia serotina). According to Tsering Yangdol, a 60-year-old woman from the Puga village, this wild plant is roasted with sand on firewood and consumed avidly among the community.
Rinchen Angdu and Tsering Yangdol also recall a plant locally called naba or nigu (Chenopodium album) which is found around the fields in Sumdo village, 53 km from the Ramsar Site of Tsomoriri Lake. This village is associated to Nuro Sumdo wetland, which is a significant part of the larger Tsomoriri ecosystem. This plant makes a delicious dish when boiled and roasted with wild onions and paired with ti-mok (Tibetan bread).
According to Rigzin Dawa, Senior Programme Officer, WWF, Western Himalayas Conservation Programme, the state of wetlands in Ladakh is abysmal. He says, “Wetlands have been dug for rampant infrastructure development such as the pipelines of Jal Jeevan Mission, the construction of mobile towers and the laying of internet cables. Further, loss of traditional ecological knowledge has caused wetlands to reach this state. For instance, the decline in pastoralism is causing a decrease in vegetation in the wetlands. There is a lack of policy advocacy and awareness among the communities about the importance of wetlands. However, all hope is not lost. If I have to talk about community-led conservation, recently in Chumathang village, the Biodiversity Management Committee (BMC) repealed an order by the administration that wanted to convert its hot spring sites into tourist spots. The village BMC strictly opposed this order and in the end the order was revoked. This is a clear example of how communities can take the steps in protecting their surroundings and in turn protecting the environment.”
WWF in Ladakh did extensive work on the wetland sites of Tsomoriri and Tsokar from 2004-14 and currently, their work has shifted to rangelands. The concern for the state of wetlands was also shared by Arif Ahmad who is working as a Programme Associate—Himalayas for Wetlands International South Asia. He says, “The Hanle marshes is a prime example of how the wetlands are being affected. Since the inauguration of Umling La, currently the world’s highest motorable road, and the formation of the Hanle Dark Sky Reserve, there has been a dramatic increase in tourism. The residents are making homestays left and right and destroying the wetland area.”
Additionally, he says, ‘Education and awareness among the local people can bring a change in conserving and involving the local youth. Through awareness campaigns in schools, with local stakeholders and youth and even the tourists, we can tell about the value of wetlands. Since the organisation has just started out in Ladakh, their work is mainly doing research work with the wildlife department. They conducted an awareness programme with homestay owners in Hanle recently. They also conducted a training programme on wetlands conservation and management in August in collaboration with the wildlife department for the field staff of the wildlife and forest department. Many of them are unaware about this subject. So, it is necessary to educate and make them aware about it.” The state is also in the process of taking various necessary steps for protecting the wetlands of Ladakh. These include regulating the activities in the wetlands. According to Wildlife Warden, Leh, Mandeep Mittal, the process of ground truthing of wetlands of Leh district has already begun. “We aim to complete it as soon as possible so that all the wetlands can be notified and once that is done, the State Wetland Authority can take appropriate actions for each of the wetlands. Once this process is done, we also plan to conduct a detailed flora and fauna study for the wetlands as there is a lack of research in this area.”
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