Sarracenia remaining in the wild...

[catbert89]

I'm doing a project in my school where we look up and report on a single species of plant or animal that is endangered. I chose S. leucophylla.

Anyway, I can't find an answer to this question I have to answer.
Approximately how many of S. leucophylla are left in the wild?

Does anyone have the answer.

[Hikenyura]

Just to tell you, i dont beleive sarracinea leuophylla is endangered. Sarracenia oreophila (green pitcher) and Sarracenia rubra ssp. jonesii (moutain sweet pitcher) are definatly endagered.

[Aidan]

Since something like 98% of their natural habitat has now been lost to drainage and development and many remaining stands are not properly managed, I think it's fair to say that most if not all Sarracenia species are endangered. Whether or not the plants are on official lists.

As to the original question, anyone taken a census? ;D

[Hikenyura]

Officially S. leucophylla are not endagered but Sarracenia oreophila is considered a critically endagered plant. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarracenia_oreophila

[Aidan]

Oh and I wouldn't trust Wikipedia any further than I could throw it.

[Hikenyura]

Your right. Wikipedia can be edited by anyone. heres a better source www.fws.gov/nc-es/plant/greenpitch.html

[catbert89]

It was on the IUCN red list as vulnerable, which in terms of the project anything that is vulnerable, threatened, endangered or worse count. Plus I can actually bring the plant in for show and tell ;D .

Its odd, I sort of searched around the internet and I couldn't find any definite numbers on remaining plants. Numbers had to be generated, just by the fact that it is threatened to some degree and that had to backed up by some hard information.

[Hikenyura]

The S. leucophylla is very vulnerable, as Aiden metioned, but not officially endangered. The S. leucophylla is my favorite sarracenia because of it's beauty and I would love to write a report on it. Go here www.sarracenia.com/faq/faq5530.html and it'll say that there are only about 100-200 sites (thats a little). I cant find the population though.

[Michael Catalani]

catbert89 said:

I'm doing a project in my school where we look up and report on a single species of plant or animal that is endangered. I chose S. leucophylla.

Anyway, I can't find an answer to this question I have to answer.
Approximately how many of S. leucophylla are left in the wild?

Does anyone have the answer.

There's still an abundance of S. leucophylla plants in the wild. There are quite a few sites that have thousands of plants. I would estimate that there are still well over 100,000 mature plants in Alabama alone.

The problem with S. leucophylla is that its range is very restricted, and the plants are most abundant in the middle of its range. Basically, S. leucophylla has most of its eggs in one basket.

It reigns supreme in lower Alabama. It is about the only place in its range in which hybrid swarms with another species are not formed. To the east just into Florida are massive hybrid swarms with S. flava. (where the sites still exist.) Just to the west into Mississippi are the hybrid swarms with S. alata. Just to the north are hybrid swarms with S. alabamensis ssp wherryii.

But in lower Baldwin county Alabama, I have not located any hybrid swarms. It grows there with S. rosea and S. psittacina. While hybrids occur between these plants and S. leucophylla, particularly with S. rosea, there are no swarms. This means that S. leucophylla can easily reproduce and dominate favorable locations without the competition from other plants in which it naturally swarms with.

But this area has and continues to be developed for farmland, residentual homes, and commercial properties. This means that the apex of S. leucophylla's range is being destroyed, making it extremely vulnerable. But within this area, it is quite abundant in the locations that are still viable.

It's very difficult to get a handle on the actual number of plants remaining. For one, in drought areas, you may not be able to locate S. leucophylla because they are only producing phyllodia. There are some sites I passed by for years during a drought that appeared to have no plants. After a few months of relief from the drought, there were suddenly fields of thousands of plants.

Also, some locations are not static. In other words, a site may have 10 acres of suitable habitat for a decade, and then have 3 acres for a decade, then 10 acres for another 10 years. So while the overall habitat is causing the populations of S. leucophylla to drop, there are locations where the number of plants are greatly expanding.

S. oreophila and S. alabamensis ssp alabamensis are in far worse shape. Both of these species only have a handful of sites that have more than a dozen plants at the location. One S. oreophila site I went to had less than ten plants, and the site is unlikely to hold any more than this. Some of the S. alabamensis sites only have 2 or 3 plants each, and some of these sites are in such bad shape that they will ultimately be lost no matter how much effort is placed into saving them.

One bit of good news is that the Nature Conservancy of Alabama manages the best remaining S. oreophila site, the largest S. alabamensis site ever found, and an excellent site for S. leucophylla.

[catbert89]

Thank you