Plant Diversity in the Montane and Submontane Forests of Southern Bahia and Northern Espírito Santo, Brazil

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The Atlantic coastal forest of Brazil is one of the World's biodiversity "hotspots." It suffers severe deforestation and has high biological diversity, especially of species found nowhere else (endemic species). Collection of biological specimens from these highly fragmented forests is unevenly distributed, with most collections made in proximity to cities or large protected areas, or in more easily accessible areas near the coast. This narrow fringe of forest comprises several areas of high endemism for plants and many groups of animals. These include the coastal montane forests of Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro (Paulista area) and the moist forests of southern Bahia. The division between the Paulista area and the Bahia area coincides with a very poorly collected region of forests in northern Espirito Santo and extreme southern Bahia. It is hypothesized that increased collecting in the gap between the Paulista area and the Bahia area will show that this gap does not exist. It will demonstrate that species now known only from the submontane forests of Bahia will be found occurring in similar forests farther south and that plants known only from the montane forests of the Serra do Mar of Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo will be found in the high elevation forests of northern Espirito Santo and southern Bahia. Staff of The New York Botanical Garden (NY), the Center for Cocoa Research (CEPEC), the State University of Santa Cruz, Bahia (UESC), and the Mello Leitao Biological Museum (MBML) of Santa Teresa, Espirito Santo, will collaborate and collect the vascular plants in the submontane and montane forests of southern Bahia and northern Espirito Santo, Brazil. The project, with support from the Office of International Science and Engineering and the Biodiversity Surveys and Inventories program , will have: 1) tested the hypotheses that there is no gap between the Paulista and Bahia centers of endemism, and that many montane and submontane species are less restricted in distribution than previously believed; 2) produced specimens that will be used by present and future biologists for expert identification, study, and descriptions of new species; 3) compiled a core checklist of the flora of the southern Bahian and northern Espirito Santo; and 4) reassessed patterns of plant endemism in the forests of eastern Brazil. This project will be critical to intelligent conservation in the Atlantic forest of eastern Brazil. The project team will find and highlight areas of submontane and montane forest for possible conservation. In addition, distributions of rare plant species will be better defined, permitting an assessment of criteria for the inclusion of each species on IUCN's Red List of threatened species. It is expected that these distributions will be seen to follow patterns of ecological zonation and the presence or absence of certain species in a given forest fragment will be predictable. Training of Brazilian botanists and NY graduate students will be another important byproduct of our research, as the US students travel to Brazil they will develop important collaborations for future work.