Rediscovery of Pedilanthus coalcomanensis (Euphorbiaceae), a threatened endemic Mexican species

Pedilanthus coalcomanensis was described from specimens collected by George B. Hinton in 1941 but was not collected again until 1999, when we found it in a tropical deciduous forest near Tehuantepec, in Chinicuila, Michoacán, Mexico. After analyzing Hinton's original collection notes, we concluded that this is the type locality. Based on the reduced geographic distribution presently known for this species (11 km(2)), the level of disturbance of its habitat, and the use of the method for the assessment of extinction risk in Mexican wild species (MER), we propose that P. coalcomanensis be covered by the appropriate Mexican legislation as a threatened species and be included in the Red List of Threatened Plants of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. Our results help justify and delimit a local biosphere reserve in northwestern Michoacán, an area that is considered a center of endemism and that has largely been deforested. Our findings have implications for research on other historical specimens collected by Hinton in this region.     

濒危物种小勾儿茶的重新发现

在距离濒危物种小勾儿茶模式标本产地约130 km处的湖北省五峰县后河国家自然保护区中重新发现了小勾儿茶Berchemiella wilsonii (Schneid.) Nakai。威尔逊1907年在湖北省兴山县采集到小勾儿茶的模式标本有花,无果实。我们在五峰县采集了小勾儿茶的花和果实标本并对其果实特征予以补充描述。     

Enigmatic morphology of Djinga felicis (Podostemaceae – Podostemoideae), a badly known endemic from northwestern Cameroon

Djinga is a monotypic genus restricted to the Cameroon Ridge (‘Dorsale Camerounaise’) of NW Cameroon. Besides the type locality Mount Djinga (Adamawa Province, near Tignère), it also grows in waterfalls near Mount Oku (NW Province). This paper describes the structure and development of Djinga felicis using scanning electron microscopy and microtome sections. Cusset's protologue is enriched considerably. Roots are green, dorsiventrally flattened and adherent to submerged rocks. They are broad ribbons or crusts (up to 1 cm broad) which branch exogenously. Root‐borne shoots (up to 17 cm) have filamentous leaves with sheaths and (occasionally) attached stipules. Flowers are borne as part of reproductive short shoots which arise exogenously along the stems and endogenously along the roots. Djinga shows non‐axillary stem branching. Reproductive shoots along the main stem usually stay short. They arise from the abaxial side of double‐sheathed leaves, a key innovation of Podostemoideae. These short shoots shift into pocket‐like stem positions clearly below their associated leaves. Each flower bud inside a spathella is erect, but with an inclined ovary. The flowers are unistaminate with a broad connective. Unlike many other Podostemoideae, the tricolpate pollen grains are arranged in both dyads and monads. The ovary is globular and unilocular. The mature 8‐ribbed capsule dehisces by two slightly unequal valves, releasing 40–50 seeds. © 2009 The Linnean Society of London, Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society, 2009, 160 , 64–81.     

Historical biogeography of Iberobathynella (Crustacea, Syncarida, Bathynellacea), an aquatic subterranean genus of Parabathynellids, endemic to the Iberian Peninsula

• 1 The origin and distribution of the species of freshwater interstitial (stygobiont) syncarids of the Iberobathynella genus (Crustacea, Parabathynellidae), endemic to the Iberian Peninsula, are considered in the context of evolutionary biogeography.
• 2 We established the most likely phylogenetic relationships between the 14 known species of the Iberobathynella genus on the basis of morphological characters. We assumed a common marine ancestor and estimated the possible phylogenetic ages of the 14 inland species from the number of cladogram nodes.
• 3 The land ages at the sites where the species are found help to tell us when the landmasses emerged definitively: most species are found in areas that have undergone one or more marine transgressions/regressions since the Triassic and which could therefore have been colonized by the common ancestors.
• 4 We assessed the Boutin–Coineau two‐step model of colonization and evolution in an attempt to elucidate the evolutionary history of Iberobathynella and to offer a plausible palaeogeographical scenario. We looked for concordance between the possible chronology of Iberobathynella taxa colonization and their phylogenetic relationships, but found none of significance. Hence, we cannot reject the possibility that evolutionary clade divergence within the genus was independent of sea‐level changes in the Senonian (88.5–65 mya) and Eocene (56.5–35.4 mya) epochs. We can therefore neither confirm nor rule out a correlation.

     

Diploicia africana comb. nov. (lichenized Ascomycetes, Physciaceae), an endemic species from the Cape Province (South Africa)

The saxicolous lichenized ascomycete Diploicia africana comb. nov. (Physciaceae) is endemic in the Cape Floral Kingdom (South Africa). Its taxonomy, morphology, chemistry, biogeography, and ecology is discussed. The most important characters of the genus Diploicia and the better known species of the genus are outlined.     

Phylogeny and colonization history of Pringlea antiscorbutica (Brassicaceae), an emblematic endemic from the South Indian Ocean Province

The origins and evolution of sub-Antarctic island floras are not well understood. In particular there is uncertainty about the ages of the contemporary floras and the ultimate origins of the lineages they contain. Pringlea R. Br. (Brassicaceae) is a monotypic genus endemic to four sub-Antarctic island groups in the southern Indian Ocean. Here we used sequences from both the chloroplast and nuclear genomes to examine the phylogenetic position of this enigmatic genus. Our analyses confirm that Pringlea falls within the tribe Thelypodieae and provide a preliminary view of its relationships within the group. Divergence time estimates and ancestral area reconstructions imply Pringlea diverged from a South American ancestor ～5Myr ago. It remains unclear whether the ancestor of Pringlea dispersed directly to the South Indian Ocean Province (SIOP) or used Antarctica as a stepping-stone; what is clear, however, is that following arrival in the SIOP several additional long-distance dispersal events must be inferred to explain the current distribution of this species. Our analyses also suggest that although Pringlea is likely to have inherited cold tolerance from its closest relatives, the distinctive morphology of this species evolved only after it split from the South American lineage. More generally, our results lend support to the hypothesis that angiosperms persisted on the sub-Antarctic islands throughout the Pliocene and Pleistocene. Taken together with evidence from other sub-Antarctic island plant groups, they suggest the extant flora of sub-Antarctic is likely to have been assembled over a broad time period and from lineages with distinctive biogeographic histories.     

Isolepis namaquana (Cypereae, Cyperaceae), a new endemic species from the winter rainfall area of South Africa

A new species, Isolepis namaquana Muasya & J.Viljoen, is described and illustrated. It is known from two localities in Namaqualand: near Kamieskroon and at the foot of the Matsikammaberge, where it grows in ephemeral wetlands. The tufted annual species is diagnosed by floral and fruit characters including glume size, bifid stigma and colliculate nutlet surface ornamentation.     

A new species of Rhus (Anacardiaceae), endemic to serpentine near Barberton, Mpumalanga (Eastern Transvaal), South Africa

Rhus pygmaea , a new species endemic to amphibolitic serpentine soils near Barberton, Mpumalanga (Eastern Transvaal) is described and illustrated. It has affinities with R. pondoensis Schonl., but differs primarily in its dwarf habit, narrower leaflets, reduced inflorescence and male flowers having a conical pistillode.     

The genus Ectonura Cassagnau, 1980in South Africa (Collembola, Neanuridae, Neanurinae), with a key to South African Neanurinae

Two new species of Neanurinae (Collembola) are described from the Western Cape, South Africa: Ectonura monochaetasp. n. and Ectonura barraisp. n.Ectonura monochaetasp. n. differs from other species in the genus by its strongly reduced chaetotaxy, and the lateral shift of dorso-internal chaetae on Abd. V and their integration in the tubercles (De+DL). Ectonura barraisp. n. is similar to Ectonura natalensis (Womersley, 1934), but differs in chaetotaxic details and chaetal group arrangement. A key to the seven species of Neanurinae recorded from South Africa is given.     

Annesorhiza calcicola (Apiaceae), a new limestone endemic species from the Western Cape Province of South Africa

The new species, Annesorhiza calcicola Magee and J.C. Manning, is described. It is known only from a few limestone outcrops around Jacobsbaai on the Saldanha Peninsula on the West Coast of South Africa. The species differs from all others in the genus in its small stature (inflorescence less than 0.3 m and leaves less than 150 mm long), the hysteranthous, pilose leaves which are completely absent at flowering (in the other species dead or dying at flowering and usually glabrous), the greyish-black, pilose inflorescence (yellowish-brown and glabrous in the other species) and the smaller homomericarpic fruit less than 5 mm long.     

The evolution of aquatic feeding in seals: insights from Enaliarctos (Carnivora: Pinnipedimorpha), the oldest known seal

The development of pierce‐feeding and loss of oral processing represented major adaptations for underwater feeding in marine mammals. We examined the evolution of pierce‐feeding and its association with changes in tooth spacing and tooth size to determine whether pierce‐feeding was practiced by the earliest known pinnipeds. Data on crown size and spacing in postcanine dentition were collected and 1) analysed by principal components analysis (PCA) to determine the tooth morphospace of arctoid carnivores, 2) analysed by least squares (LS) regression and phylogenetic independent contrasts (PIC) to determine what morphological variables were associated with increases in tooth spacing, and 3) used to reconstruct the evolution of feeding related traits within a phylogenetic context. The PCA analysis revealed that within arctoid carnivores, the greatest differences in morphospace were associated with pierce‐feeding, and the early‐diverging seal Enaliarctos was placed within the pinniped morphospace. Increased tooth spacing within Pinnipedia is a result of decreased postcanine crown size. When the evolution of dental characters is reconstructed, ‘enaliarctines’ were found to represent an intermediate stage in evolution between ‘fissiped’ and pinniped carnivores. They retained the limited tooth spacing of terrestrial carnivores, possessed postcanine crown lengths intermediate in size between pinnipeds and fissipeds, and possessed reduced heterodonty characteristic of crown pinnipeds. Our study indicated that pierce‐feeding evolved early within pinnipeds. This suggested either that pierce‐feeding evolved prior to the loss of mastication, or that pierce‐feeding evolved at the same time as loss of mastication, and well before simplification of the dentition was completed.     

Molecular phylogeny of Glyphochloa (Poaceae,Panicoideae), an endemic grass genus from the Western Ghats,India

The genus Glyphochloa (Poaceae: Panicoideae: Andropogoneae: Rottboellinae) is endemic to peninsular India and is distributed on lateritic plateaus of low and high altitude in and around Western Ghats and the Malabar Coast. The genus presumably originated and diversified in the Western Ghats. Species relationships in the genus Glyphochloa were deduced here based on molecular phylogenies inferred using nuclear ribosomal ITS sequences and plastid intergenic spacer regions (atpB-rbcL, trnT-trnL, trnL-trnF), and new observations were made of spikelet morphology, caryopsis morphology and meiotic chromosome counts. We observed two distinct clades of Glyphochloa s.l. One of these (‘group I’) includes Ophiuros bombaiensis, and is characterized by a single-awned lower glume and a base chromosome number of 6; it grows in low elevation coastal areas. The other clade (‘group II’) has a double-awned lower glume, a base chromosome number of 7, and is restricted to higher elevation lateritic plateaus; G. ratnagirica may belong to the group II clade, or may be a third distinct lineage in the genus. A sister-group relationship between group I and II taxa (with or without G. ratnagirica) is not well supported, although the genus is recovered as monophyletic in shortest trees inferred using ITS or concatenated plastid data. We present a key to species of Glyphochloa and make a new combination for O. bombaiensis.