Dioecious Plant Diversity and their Conservation Status in the Allahabad District, Uttar Pradesh, India

The paper deals with an account of the dioecious plant diversity of the Allahabad district, based on extensive fieldwork and herbarium studies as well as their conservation status according to the IUCN red list. We observed that these dioecious plants were commonly associated with multiple ecological traits such as herbs, shrubs, climbers or tree habits, fleshy fruits, and small, inconspicuous flowers. About 51 species (23 trees, 19 climbers, 4 herbs, 4 shrubs and only 1 creeper) belonging to 20 different families and 41genera are reported in this field survey. Menispermaceae is the largest family having 9 species followed by Euphorbiaceae (6 species) and Moraceae (6 species). The dominating genera of dioecious flora belong to two medium sized woody trees i.e., Diospyros (3 species) and Morus (4 species) and one woody climber i.e., Tinospora (2 species). The result indicates that dioecy is more common among woody plants with fleshy fruits in comparison to the herbs, shrubs and climbers. These plants contribute very low to the species richness of a plant community of the district. Only 7.1% of the flora of the district of Allahabad is occupied by dioecious plants of Angiosperms. According to the IUCN data, the dioecious flora of Allahabad district is categorized in different threatened criteria. Out of 51 species 16 species (31.3%) are Least Concern (LC), 34 species (66.6%) are Not Evaluated (NE), and 1 species (1.9%) is Data Deficient (DD).