An international team of botanists recently discovered two new carnivorous plants. high andes Southern Ecuador near the Peruvian border. Both species are A study published March 24 in the journal Phytokey part of with butter wurts groupThis group of about 115 species of flowering plants can trap and digest small insects with their sticky leaves. carnivorous plant These animals are used as an additional food source to compensate for nutrient deficiencies in the soil in which they are growing.
Eating insects gives these plants a competitive advantage over others and helps them thrive in challenging habitats like the tropical high Andes mountains.
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the team found pinguicula zimbrensis On the shores of high-altitude lagoons Over 11,000 feet tall and pinguicula ombrophila on almost vertical rock face Over 9,000 feet tall.lagoon and rocks Amotape – Wankabamba Zone, an area known for its rugged terrain, varied climate, and extraordinary biodiversity due to these conditions. The Amotape-Huancabamba region covers most of southern Ecuador and northern Peru.
Alvaro Pérez, a botanist at the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador, and his team were the first to discover the plant and collaborated with study co-author Tilo Henning, a botanist at the Leibniz Center for Agricultural Landscape Research (ZALF) in Germany.
“Just as suitable habitat for species is small and scattered, so is species composition.” Henning said in a statement“Both of these new species are only known from a single site with only a few dozen plant individuals each.”
Only one population with about 15 adults has been found, making this species extremely vulnerable even though it lives in isolated and difficult-to-access areas. According to the team, this limited distribution is common in the Amothepe-Huancabamba Zone, with many more new plant and animal species awaiting discovery.
The discovery of these new species has tripled the number of recorded butterwort species in Ecuador, and although the research team believes there are more new species awaiting formal scientific approval, finding them will be difficult. was a race against time.
“The results presented in this study show that the assessment of neotropical biodiversity is far from complete. New taxa continue to emerge, even in well-known groups such as carnivorous plants. have been extensively discovered and described, especially from remote areas that have become accessible in the course of endless urban sprawl.” the team wrote in the study“This is both encouraging and worrying.”
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they relentlessly quote urban sprawl and Habitat destruction They are a major threat to biodiversity in general, and particularly fragile microhabitats like these plants. Because the new species grows in protected areas, they are protected from human interference, but human-induced climate change is becoming more and more serious. carnivorous plants and ecosystem impacts, especially places such as mountain wetlands that depend on regular rainfall.
The dependence on precipitation and waterlogged soil is also reflected in the name. pinguicula ombrophila, It means “rain-loving butterwort”, and more research is needed to study how these rare species survive in response to climate change.
