Abstract
Samtskhe-Javakheti
was formed in the 1990s in southern Georgia from the historical
provinces of Meskheti, Javakheti and Tori. The majority of the
inhabitants are ethnically Armenian, with a Georgian minority. We
documented traditional plant use in Samtskhe-Javakheti, and hypothesized
that (1) plant use knowledge in general would be higher in isolated
high elevation communities, and that (2) use of home gardens would be
much more restricted to lower elevations. Fieldwork was conducted
July–August 2013, July–August 2014, and September–October 2015, using
semi-structured questionnaires. We encountered 261 plant species
belonging to 161 genera of 70 families being used in the region. Of
these, 160 species were exclusively wild-collected, 81 grown in
homegardens, and 20 were both grown in gardens and collected wild. Most
species and uses were widely used across the region, with some
particular species in the low lying villages, that allowed a wider
variety of species to be grown and gathered. The elevation of informant
community significantly fit the ordination in plant-space and use-space.
In addition, community significantly fit the ordination for both
plant-space and use-space. Informant age significantly fit the
plant-space ordination only, while informant gender was not significant
in either space
