Cultural forests are found at mountainous areas, at the sides of rivers, waterfalls and wetlands. The base for the conservation of these forests is taboos related with religious beliefs and societal values that coincide with their ecological knowledge varying from place to place. Strict observance of beliefs can play a positive role through bringing about the orderly behavior of people, which help in the conservation of the forests, land and wildlife (pla 1997).

There are ten cultural forest areas in Beto and Welo Shoba Kebeles. Worship place in the middle of the cultural forests (guudo) is central to the resource and habitat taboos enhancing cultural forest conservation. guudo is a worship place inside the cultural forests where religious ceremonies, sacraments and prayers are conducted. The guudos are mostly found at the middle of cultural forests. The sites are unknown to most people, except for the clan leaders who provide sacraments and conduct prayers. Guudos are specifically situated in areas relatively elevated, around big stones and trees at the middle of cultural forests. Only few people know where the worship place
at the middle of cultural forest is specifically situated. Informants and field guides were not eager to exactly locate such sites as they believe that it might cause a hazard on them. People who enter guudo should not be impure. Women during their menstruation, a person who has touched coffin before few days, people with some parasitic disease and anyone who may have eaten cabbage cannot enter guudo. The provision of sacrament is currently not practiced due to socio-cultural changes weakening traditional beliefs. The Shakichos interpret the belief in guudo with biblical histories of Mosses and Abraham’s prayer and sacraments described in the Old Testament on a mountain where they trace their origin.