Degraded land under plantations are the thick growth of plantation crops located outside the notified forest areas that are better delineated using multi- season satellite data in conjunction with field verified data. The lands within notified forest boundaries with less than 20% vegetative cover are classified as degraded/underutilized land. These covers a total area of 5.98 Km 2 (0.0873%) observed in northern parts of Nanjanagudu taluk ( Figure 8 Table.1). These areas appear in light gray to black tone on standard FCC due to hill shadow on one side and light red on the other side due to vegetation and tonal variation subjected to degree of soil erosion.
hill slopes, crests, plateau and eroded plains associated with barren and exposed rocky /stony wastes, mining and quarrying sites.
The rock exposure of varying lithology often barren and devoid of soil and vegetation cover appears as isolated hill exposures on plateau and plains. The final wasteland map represents the digitized wasteland categories using SoI topomap of 1:50,000 scale updated from IRS-1D, PAN+LISS III Satellite Image, Google Earth Image using GIS analysis ( Figure 8 Table.1). Individual thematic maps are prepared and being overlaid one at a time such as geology, geomorphology, soil types and land use/land to generate final composite map with a particular set of information. Geomatics technique plays a rapid role in the field of land resources, management and developmental strategic programs (Pushpavathi and Basavarajappa., 2009 Basavarajappa and Manjunatha., 2014b). The final composite map is derived from 1:250,000 scale Wasteland map of Karnataka (2003) through ArcGIS v10 and Erdas Imagine v2013 (NRSC/ISRO., 2012). Wastelands are the degraded lands that are currently underutilized, deteriorating due to lack of appropriate soil and water management or on account of natural causes. It includes all those which can be treated as miscellaneous due to their specific nature of occurrence, physical appearance and other characteristics in integrated thematic layer (Figure 7). Cauvery, Kabini, Suvarnavathi, Nugu, Gundal and Laxmanathirtha drain major parts of study area covering an area of 429 Km 2 (Figure 7). It includes man-made reservoirs /lakes /tanks /canals, besides natural lakes, rivers /streams. These are of impounded water area or in extent and often with a regulated flow of water. These include salt affected land, waterlogged areas, swampy land, sandy area, barren rocky/stony waste etc (Figure 7). Land described as degraded land which can be brought under vegetative cover with reasonable effort which is currently underutilized due to inherent /imposed constraints such as by location, environment, chemical and physical properties of the soil or financial /management constraints (Basavarajappa and Manjunatha., 2014b). Naganpur, Ainurmarigudi and Bedrampadi are the notified reserved forest observed in H.D Kote taluk, eastern parts of the Hunsur and Piriyapatna taluks ( Figure 7) (CGWB, 2012). The study area is a part of semi- malnad region covering the area of 694.2 Km 2 (CGWB, 2012).
Trees such as Teak, Honne, Rosewood, Eucalyptus and Evergreen forests are noticed all along the hill ranges in Western Ghats. study area includes 3 richest forest wealth in Karnataka state covering the area of approximately 34.52% and digitized using satellite imagery includes both moist deciduous and dry deciduous forests.