Best practices, errors, and perspectives of half a century of plant translocation in Italy

Conservation translocations are becoming common conservation practice, so there is an increasing need to understand the drivers of plant translocation performance through reviews of cases at global and regional levels. The establishment of the Italian Database of Plant Translocation (IDPlanT) provides the opportunity to review the techniques used in 186 plant translocation cases performed in the last 50 years in the heart of the Mediterranean Biodiversity Hotspot. We described techniques and information available in IDPlanT and used these data to identify drivers of translocation outcomes. We tested the effect of 15 variables on survival of translocated propagules as of the last monitoring date with binomial logistic mixed-effect models. Eleven variables significantly affected survival of transplants: life form, site protection, material source, number of source populations, propagation methods, propagule life stage, planting methods, habitat suitability assessment, site preparation, aftercare, and costs. The integration of vegetation studies in the selection of suitable planting sites significantly increased the success of translocation efforts. Although posttranslocation watering had a generally positive effect on translocation outcome, other aftercare techniques did not always increase transplant survival. Finally, we found that how funds were spent appeared to be more important than the actual amount spent. Plant translocations in Italy and in the Mediterranean area should account for the complexity of speciation, gene flow, and plant migrations that has led to local adaptations and has important implications for the choice and constitution of source material.

Ecological Preferences and Diversity of Essential Oil Composition in Endangered Wild-Growing Populations of Sideritis sipylea Boiss. (Lamiaceae) of the East Aegean Islands (Greece): Evidencing Antioxidant Potential, Antimicrobial and Cytotoxic Activities

Plants from the genus Sideritis (Lamiaceae) have been widely used in folk medicine for a long time and consequently are a focus of the scientific community. Despite this interest, explicit data about the essential oils (EOs) of the Endangered Sideritis sipylea have not been readily available to date. In this study, we investigated the ecological preferences of Greek S. sipylea and the chemical composition of the essential oils of wild-growing S. sipylea populations from two Greek islands (S1: Samos, S2: Lesvos); we explored concomitant associations with environmental factors; and we assessed their (i) antioxidant potential (two tests), (ii) antimicrobial activity against six microbial and two fungal strains, and (iii) cytotoxic effect in two human and one murine cell lines. We compiled an ecological profile in R based on all known Greek localities of S. sipylea, outlining for the first time its preferences regarding temperature (3.48 ± 1.53 °C to 30.70 ± 1.11 °C) and the precipitation regimes (5.92 ± 2.33 mm to 136 ± 11.43 mm) shaping its natural occurrence in the wild. The chemical analysis (42 compounds in total) confirmed the domination of monoterpene hydrocarbons in both samples (with quantitative and qualitative differences) and identified 12 new constituents reported in S. sipylea for the first time (e.g., Bicyclogermacrene and Cumacrene). Dominant compounds in S1 (39 constituents) were β-Myrcene (20.4%) followed by β-caryophyllene (11.8%), bicyclogermacrene (7.1%), β-pinene (6.3%), carvacrol (6.2%) and α-terpinene (6.1%), whereas in S2 (26 constituents) the main ones were α-pinene (37.3%), β-pinene (15.1%) and sabinene (12.1%), followed by β-caryophyllene (5.6%) and bicyclogermacrene (5.5%). The strong antioxidant capacity and cytotoxic activity of S. sipylea EOs are reported herein for the first time, while new insight is provided regarding their effect on bacterial and fungal strains (four ones originally tested herein). The biological activity analysis demonstrated variation among samples, with S2 being more potent than S1. Altogether, the results of the present study demonstrate the high biological potential of S. sipylea EOs with an interesting antioxidant capacity and antimicrobial and cytotoxic effects and reveal associations of natural chemodiversity with climatic factors.

The IUCN Green Status of Species: A Call for Mediterranean Botanists to Contribute to This New Ambitious Effort

In the Mediterranean Basin, a critical focal point for the conservation of plant diversity, there has been a large increase in practical conservation actions for many plant species to prevent extinction and to improve their conservation status; quantifying the effectiveness of these initiatives in reversing species declines is urgently important. In 2021, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) launched a new tool that allows the impact of conservation actions on plant species to be assessed. The Green Status of Species is a new set of metrics under the Red List of Threatened Species that assigns species to recovery categories, complementary to the classic extinction risk categories. Crucially, the Green Status of Species provides methods to evaluate the impact of past conservation, and the potential for future conservation impact, on species status and recovery in a standardized way. Considering the efforts made so far for the conservation of Mediterranean threatened plants, using the Green Status of Species would be highly useful to direct future conservation policies. We, therefore, encourage botanists and practitioners working on threatened plants in the Mediterranean area to use this new assessment tool to inform conservation and recovery programs.

Analysis of floristic composition and species diversity of vascular plants native to the State of Palestine (West Bank and Gaza Strip)

This study aims at providing an updated checklist of the native vascular flora of the Palestinian West Bank and Gaza Strip (State of Palestine, SP), serving as a taxonomic and nomenclatural basis for botanical research and encouraging new floristic surveys and biosystematic studies. The study provides an up-to-date checklist of native vascular taxa of the SP and their distribution within the plant districts in the country. This is the very first annotated checklist for the native vascular plants of the SP which incorporates recent name changes, new distribution records, habitat, herbarium specimens catalouge, Red List criteria, wild edible plants, endemism and use in Traditional Palestinian Herbal Medicine. The quantitative analysis of the flora has shown that the SP hosts 1826 taxa, distributed in 686 genera and 108 families; five taxa are gymnosperms, nine taxa are Pteridophytes and 1812 taxa are angiosperms. The most represented families are Leguminosae (222 taxa, 12.2%), Asteraceae (197, 10.2%) and Poaceae (196, 10.7%), while the most represented genera are Trifolium (38, Leguminosae), Silene (32, Caryophyllaceae), Astragalus (27, Leguminosae), Medicago (26, Leguminosae), Allium (25, Amaryllidaceae) and Euphorbia (25, Euphorbiaceae). Annuals (52.4%), Hemicryptophytes (20.2%) and Chamaephytes (12.2%) are the most represented life-forms amongst the SP flora. The richest plant districts in the SP vascular plant taxa are Gaza Strip (GS) (1216 taxa), Jerusalem and Hebron Mountains (JHM) (1235) and Nablus Mountains (NM) (1126). Agglomerative hierarchical clustering (AHC) permitted the division of SP into two main regions, based on the existence of vascular plant taxa: Region 1 (western plant districts with 1128-1237 taxa) with higher water availability and temperate Mediterranean climate which permit the establishment of more than 65% of the total SP flora in these districts and Region 2 (eastern plant districts with 571-698 taxa), characterised by desert and semi-desert conditions, as well as the presence of alluvial and co-alluvial soils, which allow the survival of lower numbers of plant taxa. One hundred and sixty-five taxa of the SP flora are endemic and near-endemic. However, in comparison with some countries of the Mediterranean Basin, this number is below the average endemism concentration, along with other southern arid countries, such as Tunisia and Egypt. In total, there are 102 threatened plant taxa, belonging to 39 families and 83 genera representing 5.6% of the total plants in the SP. IUCN and the Conservation Measures Partnership (CMP) unified classification of direct threats for SP Red-Listed plants has shown a high extinction risk to the Palestinian threatened wild flora, with 76.5% of the threatened species being either critically endangered (CR) or endangered (EN); only 23.5% were vulnerable (VU). However, several taxa are threatened by numerous factors including small population size, human activities, for example, conversion of traditional to intensive agriculture accompanied by deep ploughing and the application of pesticides, urban development and construction, global climatic change, drying of marshes and wetlands, quarrying, fires and pollution. This checklist can help focus conservation efforts and provide a framework for research, protection and policy applications for the SP flora, especially for the endemic and threatened plants.

Molecular phylogeny and taxonomy of the Hydrangeaserrata complex (Hydrangeaceae) in western Japan, including a new subspecies of H.acuminata from Yakushima

According to the contemporary classification of Hydrangea native to Japan, H.serrata is a polymorphic species including six varieties. We discovered a plant identified as H.serrata, but morphologically distinct from previously known varieties, in Yakushima island where approximately 50 endemic species are known. To determine the relationship of this plant with previously known varieties, we examined morphology and constructed a highly resolved phylogeny of H.serrata and its relatives using three chloroplast genomic regions, rbcL, trnL intron, psbA-trnH, and two nuclear genomic regions, ITS1 and ITS2, and Multiplex ISSR genotyping by sequencing (MIG-seq). Based on these morphological and phylogenetic observations, we describe Hydrangeaacuminatasubsp.yakushimensissubsp. nov. as a newly discovered lineage in Yakushima, Japan and propose Hydrangeaminamitanii stat. nov. and Hydrangeaacuminatasubsp.australisstat. nov. which were previously treated as varieties of H.serrata.

A new subspecies of Stellariaalsine (Caryophyllaceae) from Yakushima, Japan

An unknown taxon of Stellaria was discovered in Yakushima, a Japanese island known to harbor several endemic species. To determine the identity of this taxon, this study employed MIG-seq for the reconstruction of a finely resolved phylogenetic tree of the newly discovered taxon, along with some related species of Stellaria. The results showed that the newly discovered taxon is a relative of S.alsine. Based on this result, Stellariaalsinesubsp.nanasubsp. nov. was published.

Conditional Seed Dormancy Helps Silene hicesiae Brullo & Signor. Overcome Stressful Mediterranean Summer Conditions

Investigations on seed biology and ecology are of major importance for the conservation of threatened plants, both providing baseline information and suggesting practical approaches. In our study, we focused on the germination behavior of Silene hicesiae Brullo & Signor., a narrow endemic species to Panarea and Alicudi (Aeolian Archipelago, Italy), as well as one of the 50 most threatened Mediterranean island plants. Specifically, the effects of temperature, light, seed age, seed source, and collection year were evaluated; in addition, threshold temperatures and thermal–time parameters were estimated. The thermal range for fresh seed germination resulted between 5 and 15 °C, reaching up to 20 and 25 °C at increasing seed age, with 30 °C being clearly beyond the ceiling temperature. This behavior indicates that fresh seeds exhibit the Type 1 non-deep physiological dormancy, and that germination is regulated by conditional dormancy. This dormancy syndrome emerged as a highly efficient adaptation strategy for this species and, together with thermo-inhibition, would allow seeds to counteract or take advantage of Mediterranean environmental conditions. The comparison between the wild Panarea population and the corresponding ex situ cultivated progeny has enabled the identification of the latter as a suitable seed source for sustainable in situ reinforcement actions, at least in the short-term; indeed, plant cultivation for a single generation did not produce significant modifications in the germination behavior of the offspring.

Citizen Science Uncovers Phytophthora ramorum as a Threat to Several Rare or Endangered California Manzanita Species

The Sudden Oak Death (SOD) Blitzes consist of yearly surveys led by citizen scientists designed to map the distribution of Phytophthora ramorum, cause of the forest disease called SOD, across northern California. During the 2017 Santa Cruz County SOD Blitz, six rare or endangered Arctostaphylos (manzanita) species were found to be possibly symptomatic for the first time. Symptoms included branch cankers and associated canopy mortality, and affected multiple individuals per species. Isolates of P. ramorum were obtained from each of the six species and, through a 30-day-long inoculation experiment on live plants, Koch's postulates were completed for each one of them, conclusively determining that they all are hosts of this pathogen. Two additional manzanita species were later found to be apparently symptomatic in Marin County. Inoculations on detached branches using an isolate of P. ramorum obtained from one of the six rare species from Santa Cruz County were successful, suggesting that these two species may also be hosts of P. ramorum. Detached leaves of all eight species were also successfully inoculated at the University of California-Berkeley in fall 2018 and then again in spring 2019. In these cases, the same isolate was used for all inoculations, in order to obtain information on the comparative susceptibility of the eight species in question. Both branch and leaf inoculations identified significant interspecific differences in susceptibility. The production of sporangia was low on all species but it was not zero, suggesting that sporulation may cause within-plant and limited across-plant contagion, especially in rainy years.