Western Ghats

The Western Ghats is a mountain range along the eastern side of Kerala. It separates the Deccan Plateau from a coastal plain along the Arabian Sea. The range runs approximately one thousand six hundred kilometres through the Indian states of Karnataka, Maharashtra, Goa, Kerala and Tamil Nadu ending at Kanyakumari, at the southernmost tip of India.

Situated in the southern part of the range in the Anaimalai Hills in Kerala and the western Tamil Nadu, Ana Mudi two thousand six hundred ninety five metres (8,842 ft) is the highest peak in Western Ghats. Agasthya mala one thousand eight hundred sixty eight metres (6,129 ft), Vellarimala two thousand two hundred metres (7,218 ft), Banasura Peak two thousand seventy three metres (6,801 ft) and Chembra Peak two thousand one hundred metres (6,890 ft) are also in Kerala.

Western Ghats cover sixty thousand square kilometres and form the area for a complex of river systems that drain forty per cent of India's territory. The area is one of the world's ten "Hottest biodiversity hotspots" and has over five thousand species of flowering plants, five hundred eight bird species, one hundred thirty nine mammal species and one hundred seventy nine amphibian species. At least three hundred twenty five threatened species occur in the Western Ghats.

These hills are home to tea and coffee plantations. They are home to four moist broadleaf forest ecoregions - the South Western Ghats montane rain forests and South Western Ghats moist deciduous forests, the North Western Ghats montane rain forests and North Western Ghats moist deciduous forests. The southern ecoregions are wetter and more species-rich.

Western Ghats