Pakkamalai is a mountain and forest reserve in Villupuram district of Tamil Nadu, located 45 km southwest of

Gingee Gingee, also known as Senji or Jinji and originally called Singapuri, is a panchayat town in Viluppuram district in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Gingee is located between three hills covering a perimeter of 3 km, and lies west of the Sa ...

Geography

Pakkamalai is steep-sided plateau that reaches an elevation of over 500 meters. In addition to being a forest reserve, Pakkamalai is a sacred forest. There is a shrine to the Goddess

Durga Durga ( sa, दुर्गा, ) is a major Hindu goddess, worshipped as a principal aspect of the mother goddess Mahadevi. She is associated with protection, strength, motherhood, destruction, and wars. Durga's legend centres around co ...

on one of the peaks, and a temple to

Perumal Perumal (the 'Great One') is the name of a Hindu deity. It was also a medieval Indian royal title of: *Western Ganga dynasty Narayanan, M. G. S. ''Perumāḷs of Kerala''. Thrissur (Kerala): CosmoBooks, 2013. 171. **Sripurusha **Rajamalla **Nitim ...

(Vishnu) at mid-elevation.

Climate

Maximum temperature ranges from 30° to 36 °C in the summer, and 24 °C during the winter months. Mean annual rainfall is 700 mm.

Ecology

Pakkamalai forest reserve covers an area of 22.38 km², and the mountain's dry forests contain a mix of species characteristic of the coastal dry evergreen forests which lie to the east, and the dry deciduous forests that lie to the west in the

Eastern Ghats The Eastern Ghats are a discontinuous range of mountains along India's eastern coast. The Eastern Ghats pass through Odisha, Andhra Pradesh to Tamil Nadu in the south passing some parts of Karnataka as well as Telangana. They are eroded and cut ...

. Typical dry evergreen species in the forests include ''

Atalantia monophylla ''Atalantia monophylla'' is a species of plants in the family Rutaceae. They are woody climbers naturally found in tropical regions. Several species in the genus ''Atalantia monophylla'' have been used in traditional medicine, such as the Ayur ...

Acacia intsia ''Acacia'', commonly known as the wattles or acacias, is a large genus of shrubs and trees in the subfamily Mimosoideae of the pea family Fabaceae. Initially, it comprised a group of plant species native to Africa and Australasia. The genus nam ...

Combretum albidum ''Combretum'', the bushwillows or combretums, make up the type genus of the family Combretaceae. The genus comprises about 272 species of trees and shrubs, most of which are native to Tropics, tropical and southern Africa, about 5 to Madagascar, ...

, Dichrostachys cinerea'', and ''

Psydrax dicoccos ''Psydrax dicoccos'' is a species of flowering plant in the family Rubiaceae. It is found from southeast China to tropical Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in ...

'', and typical dry deciduous species include '' Cochlospermum religiosum, Deccania pubescens,

Garuga pinnata ''Garuga pinnata'' is a deciduous tree species from the family Burseraceae. It occurs in Asia: from the Indian sub-continent, southern China and Indo-China; in Vietnam it may be called ''dầu heo''. No subspecies are listed in the Catalogue of ...

, Hildegardia populifolia,

Ochna lanceolata ''Ochna lanceolata'' is a species of plant in the family Ochnaceae. It is native to India and Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit- ...

'', and ''

Premna tomentosa ''Premna'' is a genus of flowering plants in the mint family, Lamiaceae, first described for modern science in 1771. It is widespread through tropical and subtropical regions in Africa, southern Asia, northern Australia, and various islands in th ...

''. It is also home to several endemic and limited-range species. ''Hubera senjiana'', a rare species of tree, is found only on Pakkamalai, growing in dry rocky soils along forest fringes between 200–300 metres elevation in association with ''Phyllanthus polyphyllus'', ''Stenosiphonium russellianum'', and ''Justicia beddomei''. The surrounding lowlands are in the Deccan thorn scrub forests ecoregion. Pakkamalai is home to the easternmost population of the grizzled giant squirrel ''(Ratufa macroura)''. It was previously known only in the Western Ghats and the

Palani Hills The Palani Hills are a mountain range in the southern Indian states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu. The Palani Hills are an eastward extension of the Western Ghats ranges, which run parallel to the west coast of India. The Palani Hills adjoin the hi ...

. In 2019, the critically endangered blue tarantula ''

Poecilotheria metallica ''Poecilotheria metallica'', also known as the peacock tarantula, is an Old World species of tarantula. It is the only blue species of the genus ''Poecilotheria''. Like others in its genus it exhibits an intricate fractal-like pattern on the abd ...

'', known as the peacock parachute spider or Gooty tarantula, was discovered living in the mountains.Kothandapani Raman, Sivangnanaboopathidoss Vimalraj, Bawa Mothilal Krishnakumar, Natesan Balachandran, and Abhishek Tomar (2019). "Range extension of the Gooty Tarantula Poecilotheria metallica (Araneae: Theraphosidae) in the Eastern Ghats of Tamil Nadu, India". ''Journal of Threatened Taxa'', 26 August 2019 11(10): 14373–14376. www.threatenedtaxa.org.

References

{{coord, 12, 10, 55, N, 79, 17, 23, E, display=title Hills of Tamil Nadu Protected areas of Tamil Nadu Sacred groves of India Viluppuram district