Summary
A new species of Kalanchoe, K. hypseloleuce Friis & M. G. Gilbert, was found during field work in Ethiopia in 2015, and is established here. It is characterised by its tall stature (2 – 3 m), entire, sessile, lanceolate leaves and pure white flowers with abaxially minutely papillose corolla lobes (otherwise, the plant is glabrous). It is not obviously related to any previously known species, but an earlier, incomplete specimen has been cited as K. prittwitzii Engl. in the literature. K. hypseloleuce was collected on limestone in Acacia-Commiphora woodland and bushland at c. 1400 m a.s.l. It occurs in the southern part of the eastern Ethiopian escarpment in the Arsi and Eastern Harerghe zones of the Oromo Regional State. K. hypseloleuce is documented with images and maps, its climate envelope has been modelled, and a conservation assessment made. With the current level of threat, this could be Vulnerable to Near Threatened (VU-NT). Given the threat from habitat degradation is not imminent, we recommend the species to be listed as Near Threatened (NT).
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Adanson, M. (1763). Familles des plantes 2. Vincent, Paris.
Bachman, S., Moat, J., Hill, A. W., de la Torre, J. & Scott, B. (2011). Supporting Red List threat assessments with GeoCAT: geospatial conservation assessment tool. In: V. Smith & L. Penev (eds), e-Infrastructures for data publishing in biodiversity science. ZooKeys 150: 117 – 126, and GeoCAT. Geospatial Conservation Assessment Tool. [On line]. http://geocat.kew.org/ (accessed 14 May 2016).
Breugel, P. von, Friis, I. & Sebsebe Demissew (2016). The transitional semi-evergreen bushland in Ethiopia: characterization and mapping of its distribution using predictive modelling. Appl. Veg. Sci. 19 (2): 355 – 367.
Busby, J. (1991). BIOCLIM — a bioclimate analysis and prediction system. In: C. Margules & M. Austin (eds), Nature Conservation: Cost Effective Biological Surveys and Data Analyses, pp. 64 – 68. CSIRO, Melbourne.
DIVA-GIS (2015). DIVA-GIS 7.5, and climate data [On line]. http://www.diva-gis.org/ and http://www.diva-gis.org/climate (both accessed 18 August 2015).
Engler, A. (1906). Über die Vegetationsverhältnisse von Harar und des Gallahochlandes auf Grund der Expedition von Freiherrn von Erlanger und Hrn. Oscar Neumann. Sitzungsber. Königl. Preuss. Akad. Wiss. Berlin 40 (2): 726 – 747.
Friis, I., Sebsebe Demissew & Breugel, P. van (2010). Atlas of the potential natural vegetation of Ethiopia. Biol. Skr. 58: 1 – 307.
____ & Weber, O. (2014). Crotalaria trifoliolata (Leguminosae: Papilionoideae), a previously incompletely known Ethiopian endemic rediscovered after 120 years. Kew Bull. 69: 9536, pp. 1 – 9. DOI:10.1007/S12225-014-9536-7.
____, ____, van Breugel, P. & Sebsebe Demissew (2016). An endangered Ethiopian endemic, Crotalaria trifoliolata (Leguminosae: Papilionoideae), and its little-known habitat. Symb. Bot. Upsal. 38: 19 – 39.
Gehrig, H., Gaußmann, O., Marx, H., Schwarzott, D. & Kluge, M. (2001). Molecular phylogeny of the genus Kalanchoe (Crassulaceae) inferred from nucleotide sequences of the ITS-1 and ITS-2 regions. Plant. Sci. 160: 827 – 835.
Gilbert, M. G. (1989). Crassulaceae. In: I. Hedberg & S. Edwards (eds), Flora of Ethiopia, 3: 5 – 26. Addis Ababa, Asmara and Uppsala.
Google Earth. (2016). Google Earth. Vers. 7.1.5.1557 [On line]. (Accessed 15 May 2016).
Harvey, W. H. (1862). VIII. Kalanchoe Adans. In: W. H. Harvey & O. W. Sonder (eds), Flora Capensis, Vol. 2: 378 – 380. Hodges, Smith & Co., Dublin.
Hijmans, R. J., Cameron, S. E., Parra, J. L., Jones, P. G. & Jarvis, A. (2005). Very high resolution interpolated climate surfaces for global land areas. Internat. J. Climatology 25: 1965 – 1978.
IPNI (2016). International Plant Names Index. [On line]. http://www.ipni.org/ (accessed 15 May 2016).
IUCN (2012). IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria. Vers. 3.1. Second ed. Gland & Cambridge.
____ (2016). IUCN Standards and Petitions Subcommittee. 2016. Guidelines for Using the IUCN Red List Categories and Criteria. Version 12 (February 2016). Prepared by the Standards and Petitions Subcommittee. [On line]. http://www.iucnredlist.org/documents/RedListGuidelines.pdf (accessed 30 September 2016).
McNeill, J., Barrie, F. R., Buck, W. R., Demoulin, V., Greuter, W., Hawksworth, D. L., Herendeen, P. S., Knapp, S., Marhold, K., Prado, J., Prud'homme van Reine, W. F., Smith, G. F., Wiersema, J. H. & Turland, N. J. (2012). International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (Melbourne Code). Regnum Veg. 154.
Mengesha Tefera, Tadiwos Chernet & Workineh Haro (1996). Geological Map of Ethiopia. 2nd Edtion. Ministry of Mines, Geological Survey of Ethiopia, GSE, Addis Ababa. http://extra.geus.info/cet/ethiopia/Ethiopia_Map.pdf (Accessed 15 May 2016).
Mesfin Seifu & Fekadu Beyene (2014). Local livelihoods and institutions in managing wildlife ecosystems: The case of Babile Elephant Sanctuary in Ethiopia. J. Nat. Conserv. 22 (6): 559 – 569.
Nix, H. A. (1986). A biogeographic analysis of the Australian elapid snakes. In: R. Longmore (ed.), Atlas of Elapid Snakes of Australia. Austral. Fl. Fauna Ser., No. 7: 4 – 15.
Quattrocchi, U. (2000). CRC World Dictionary of Plant Names. Vol. 2, D – L. CRC Press, London, New York, Washington DC.
Thulin, M. (1993). Crassulaceae. In: M. Thulin (ed.), Flora of Somalia, Vol. 1: 87 – 93. Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
Wickens, G. E. (1987). Crassulaceae. In: R. M. Polhill (ed.), Flora of Tropical East Africa. A. A. Balkema, Rotterdam.
Acknowledgements
We are grateful to the Carlsberg Foundation, Copenhagen, for continued financial support of our studies of Ethiopian flora and vegetation. The Bentham-Moxon Trust, RBG Kew, supported Odile Weber’s participation in the field-work in 2013. The specimens from the field trips in 2013 – 2015 were identified by us at the herbarium of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, where we also received help with their handling. Ib Friis, Odile Weber and Sebsebe Demissew want to thank their travel companions on the field trips: Wege Abebe, Addis Ababa University (on all trips, also very helpful with the handling of the collections at ETH), Abubaker Adem (our guide from Bale), Adem Beyane (our guide from Harerghe), and Ermias Getachew, driver at the Faculty of Science, Addis Ababa University (on all trips). They have been excellent helpers and good company. Professor Asfawossen Asrat, Addis Ababa University, kindly commented on the geology of the area, and Quentin Luke, Nairobi, found a duplicate of Burger 3596 for us at the East African Herbarium (EA). Finally, we are grateful to Steve Bachman, Kew, for help with GeoCAT and Victoria G. Friis, Copenhagen, for having produced the drawings for Fig. 2, as well as for her help with dissections and her observant analyses of floral details.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Friis, I., Gilbert, M.G., van Breugel, P. et al. Kalanchoe hypseloleuce (Crassulaceae), a new species from eastern Ethiopia, with notes on its habitat. Kew Bull 72, 30 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12225-017-9704-7
Accepted:
Published:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12225-017-9704-7