Abstract
The rare and endangered plant Primulina tabacum is a calciphilous perennial herb found only at the entrances of a small number of karst cave drainages in southern China. In a conservation effort, we identified potentially suitable habitats and reintroduced P. tabacum plantlets (propagated in vitro) to one historical and two new cave entrances. The transplanted seedlings survived (10%) at only one new location where a moss, Gymnostomiella longinervis Broth, existed. Our field observations indicate that it is probably impossible for this rare plant to naturally recolonize the places where it went extinct because the habitats have changed. Transplanted P. tabacum grew slower than wild P. tabacum. The transplanted P. tabacum performed especially well under the cover of the nursing moss. Positive interactions between species, i.e., nurse plant effects, are important for reintroduction of success. Although light and soil conditions also appeared to be critical for transplantation success, the presence of moss should be considered as a useful and convenient indicator of suitable habitat for P. tabacum. This study case suggests that the use of new propagation methods and nurse plants can facilitate the reintroduction of rare and endangered herbs.
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Acknowledgments
This research was supported by the National Basic Research Program of China (2008BAJ10B03, 2007CB411600) and the Guangdong Sci-Tech Planning Project (07118249, 2008A060207017, 2007A060306011). We thank Mr. Xiao Lei for monitoring, Mr. Guowei Chu for nutrient element analysis, Prof. Li Zhang for moss species identification, Prof. Chonghui Liao for the insect species identification, and Dr. Shijin Li, Dr. Wenjun Duan, Mr. Xiangxu Huang, and Miss Changxin He for fieldwork assistance. We also thank the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on an earlier version of the manuscript. Thanks also to Prof. Bruce Jaffee for polishing the English.
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Ren, H., Ma, G., Zhang, Q. et al. Moss is a key nurse plant for reintroduction of the endangered herb, Primulina tabacum Hance. Plant Ecol 209, 313–320 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11258-010-9754-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11258-010-9754-5