Sakhoveyi Lohe
Department of Geography
Kohima Science College
Jotsoma, Nagaland (India)
Vekhosalu
Pfutsero Government College
Pfutsero, Nagaland (India)
Abstract
Murhepu Catchment, a mini-catchment, is in Phek District of Nagaland. The catchment ecosystem is under constant threat of mass wasting and erosion. It is, therefore, imperative for planners and managers of environment to understand the morphometry of the catchment for its better management. Murhepu Catchment is a 4th order stream catchment (Table 1) having 123 streams with a total area of 17.5 km² and total stream length of 68.76 km respectively. The catchment has high Stream frequency of 7no/km2 and drainage density of 3.9km/km2 showing high dissection and closeness of one channel to another channel. Murhepu catchment is a semi-circular basin. Both Absolute & Relative reliefs are high. Murhepu exhibit steep gradient (Fig. 5 & Table 2) indicating active vertical erosion of river bed and the catchment is in juvenile stage. The gradient of slopes increases along with increasing altitude (Fig. 6). Murhepu is a purely deforested catchment and therefore, massive afforestation is required. Need measures to check devastating slope failure. Action plans is required for rejuvenation of drying spring wells and also to combat emerging positive thermal anomaly in Pfutsero town in order to restore highly degraded Murhepu catchment. Therefore, the author proposed environmental management plans for Murhepu Catchment (Table 5).
