Taxonomic revisions, monographs and floras are the most important, and often the only source of data for assessing the extinction risk of plants, with recent revisions contributing to more accurate assessments. The recently completed Red List of South African plants involved an overview of the taxonomic literature pertaining to the South African flora, providing an opportunity to identify critical gaps in taxonomic coverage. In this study we identified taxonomic research priorities for effective conservation of South African plants. Priorities were identified at genus level, according to time since last revision, level of endemism, collecting effort, proportion of taxa included in revisions, and specimen identification confidence. Although the results indicate that 62% of the flora has been recently revised, revisionary taxonomic output has declined drastically, particularly in the past 10 years. This decline is a result of a decrease in revisionary productivity per taxonomist and not a result of a decline in the number of working taxonomists. The family Aizoaceae is the top priority for taxonomic research with 55% of taxa in need of revision, followed by Hyacinthaceae with 34% of taxa not yet revised. Ericaceae, Euphorbiaceae, Rutaceae, Malvaceae, Asteraceae and Acanthaceae are also priorities with over 30% of taxa last revised before 1970. We recommend the reinstatement of the Flora of Southern Africa project in an online format in order to centralise South Africa's existing taxonomic information and reinvigorate revisionary taxonomic study. This project will allow South Africa to fulfil its commitments to the Convention on Biodiversity by achieving Target 1 of the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation.
a b s t r a c t a r t i c l e i n f oAvailable online xxxx Edited by A Potts Keywords: Cape Floristic Region Ecotone Fire Global climate change Seedling survival Soil typeBoundaries between Fynbos and Succulent Karoo vegetation in the Greater Cape Floristic Region are frequently characterised by sharp transitions from sandy, dystrophic to loamy, mesotrophic soils, together with a more gradual climate transition from cooler, wetter conditions typical of Fynbos at higher elevations to warmer, drier conditions at lower elevations typical of Succulent Karoo. There is very high species turnover across these boundaries, providing an opportunity to disentangle the relative roles of climate and soil type in determining the biome boundary. A fully reciprocal transplant approach was employed here to investigate this question, using three species from each biome occurring naturally in close proximity at Jonaskop, Western Cape. Greenhouse-germinated and established seedlings of all species were planted into both sandy, dystrophic and loamy, mesotrophic soils typical of each biome at four sites along an elevational transect (elevations 545 m, 744 m, 953 m, 1303 m) at Jonaskop, and their growth and survivorship monitored for 7 months. At least one site on the elevation gradient represented annual climate rainfall and temperature conditions during the experimental period typical of the range edge for each of the selected species, this typically being the lowest elevation site (warm × dry) for Fynbos species (Protea humiflora, P. magnifica and P. amplexicaulis), and the highest elevation site (cool × wet) for Succulent Karoo species (Ruschia lineolata, Drosanthemum speciosum and Pteronia incana). Fynbos species showed significant adverse responses to loamy mesotrophic soil, with highly significant reductions in growth and high and rapid rates of mortality relative to their native soil. Fynbos species showed somewhat reduced growth and survival at the lowest elevation when grown in native soils, but demonstrated significant interaction between soil type and elevation with much lower growth and survival at the lowest elevation on the loamy soils. Surprisingly, all the Fynbos species showed reductions in growth and survival at the highest elevation, with significant reductions in two of the three species. Succulent Karoo species, by contrast, showed very few significant performance differences between soil types and few significant soil × elevation interactive effects, but did show significant growth and survival responses to elevation, with high growth and survival at mid-level elevations, far higher than their natural extent at the site. These results suggest that the selected Succulent Karoo species are neither edaphically nor climatically constrained from establishing and growing in sandy dystrophic soils and cool climates typical of the Fynbos vegetation along this elevation gradient, but that Fynbos species are strongly limited both edaphically and climatically from growing under conditions typical of the Succulent Karoo. We ...
Taxonomy provides a universal method to classify biodiversity at different scales locally and globally. Currently, existing taxonomic treatments are scattered, limiting their accessibility and utility. The Convention on Biological Diversity has responded to this challenge by setting the goal of compiling a World Flora Online (Global Strategy for Plant Conservation Target 1, 2011–2020). This can be done by aggregating electronically available information provided by each country, region or specialist group. Developing a Flora or a high‐level monographic product requires time and input from a large pool of taxonomic specialists. Completing a Flora may be difficult to accomplish for phytodiverse countries, such as South Africa, if the 2020 target is to be met. Fortunately, a large number of taxonomic contributions and many electronic tools exist that can enhance progress. Where these are available, efforts have to be made to access and digitise the literature. Here we describe a pragmatic approach to developing an online Flora, involving taking floristic information from multiple, previously published sources, digitising the legacy literature where needed and aggregating the required information into a single portal. South Africa is committed to producing an online Flora (the e‐Flora of South Africa) and contributing the information to the World Flora Online initiative following the aggregator portal approach, a method described here that might be useful for other countries with high phytodiversity.
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