Save Plants

The team from IAE began their collections journey in July, postponed a month by the fires sweeping through the state. Most of the high elevation wetland habitat occupied by Salix arizonica exists in remote wilderness areas, where motorized equipment is not allowed. For this reason, a two-person team from IAE backpacked their way through US Forest Service land in northern New Mexico carrying limited supplies and hiking up to 14 miles a day.

While fire closures blocked access to parts of the willow’s habitat, preventing them from making collections at all of their intended sites, the IAE team was able to collect cuttings from three metapopulations of Salix arizonica occurring in both the Carson and Santa Fe National Forests. Nearly 250 cuttings from 123 maternal plants were collected and are currently being maintained on a propagation block at the Pueblo of Santa Ana Nursery, a frequent partner of IAE’s Southwest Office where IAE’s native seeds are frequently propagated for restoration. The conservation cuttings, which were placed in soil shortly after returning from the field, consistently grew roots within a few weeks and are continuing to do well.

While they were in the field journeying through Salix arizonica habitat in New Mexico for this collection expedition, IAE simultaneously surveyed the species’ populations. Many of the willow’s existing known sites were historical and needed updated threat assessments so land managers and conservationists can adjust management practices for the species’ current state.

One site which had not been surveyed since 2001, when it had been a healthy population, was unfortunately found extirpated; the hope is to prevent future losses. IAE received crucial information on historical populations and population access from USFS, the New Mexico Energy Minerals and Natural Resources Department, and the US Geological Survey. The Arboretum at Flagstaff provided protocols for field collection of cuttings. This emphasizes the importance of partnership in conservation. The CPC – USFS agreement which funded this conservation collection supports rare plants located on USFS Region 3 land, funding conservation collections to be stored in CPC member institutions.

While conducting surveys, IAE found Salix arizonica to be heavily impacted by grazing and browsing by cattle and elk, as well as hydrologic changes. IAE plans to survey the populations they were unable to access due to last summer’s fires in the coming field seasons. Next steps in the conservation strategy for this species should include addressing the amount of grazing on vulnerable populations and potentially hydrologic restorations in degraded sites. In the far future, IAE’s Southwest Office would ideally be able to plant grown out seedlings or cuttings to help boost wild populations.

The Tree Gene Conservation Partnership offers matching grants to support scouting and collecting trips, and distribution of propagules to collaborating public gardens. Collaborators scout wild populations and attempt to collect seed or propagation material from across the native range. Our guidelines recommend utilizing CPC’s Best Plant Conservation Practices with the goal of safeguarding germplasm in multiple living collections at public gardens. Project organizers consult experts about targeted species and engage local collaborators from state and local agencies to scout wild populations. Collectors are encouraged to incorporate two methods of gene capture to increase the likelihood of successful conservation efforts.

Four projects led by National Tropical Botanical Garden have focused on endangered and critically endangered Hawaiian endemics including Alectryon micrococcus var micrococcus, Melicope rostrata, Ochrosia kauaiensis, Alectryon macrococcus var macrococcus, and Pritchardia minor. Two additional projects are underway in 2023 targeting Melicope nealae and Melicope stoneii. Hawaiian project leaders have noted that this Partnership is filling a critical funding niche in supporting conservation activities in Hawaii.

On the mainland, projects have targeted Magnolia tripetala, Magnolia pyramidata growing in ravines of the coastal plain from South Carolina to Texas, and the northern edge of Magnolia virginiana var virginiana to capture genes for winter hardiness. Another project worked with local collaborators in Puerto Rico focusing on island endemics Magnolia portoricensis and Magnolia splendens.

Other projects have targeted Juglans californica and endemic Juglans major in the West, while Minnesota Landscape Arboretum has led a multi-year project focused on endangered Juglans cinerea in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Iowa.

Many oak species throughout the United States have benefited from targeted collaborative projects supported in part by this Partnership including: Quercus acerifolia, Q ajoensis, Q arkansana, Q boyntonii, Q cedrosensis, Q dumosa, Q georgiana, Q havardii, Q macrocarpa, Q oglethorpensis, Q palmeri, Q sadleriana, Q toumeyi, and multiple oak species in the Trans-Pecos mountain range.

Other diverse projects have targeted Lyonothamnus floribundus subspecies floribundus, Zamia integrifolia native to Florida and Georgia, Pinus torreyana subspecies torreyana in San Diego County and Pinus torreyana subspecies insularis on Santa Rosa Island, and Aesculus parviflora which grows in the same habitat as Arkansas Oak. This year, the Partnership is helping support conservation projects for Cotinus obovatus, Quercus ajoensis and Q. toumeyi, and sampling from additional populations of Quercus boyntonii and Quercus palmeri.

This Partnership to date has awarded nearly $300,000 in grants to help support projects targeting thirty five species in twenty eight states & Puerto Rico. These scouting and collecting activities foster diverse collaborations and help bring together scientists, specialists, and conservation practitioners from Federal agencies, universities, non-governmental organizations, and public gardens. The Partnership serves mutual interests of APGA and the Forest Service to advance germplasm conservation through collaborative, shared stewardship in an effort to help slow the rate of unprecedented global biodiversity loss.

To raise awareness of these collaborative conservation activities, projects which have received funding through this Partnership are showcased on APGA’s website. Each profile is organized by its targeted species and includes a list of participants, safeguarding sites, and project reports. Activities of the Partnership are also highlighted through conference presentations and articles, and cross-promoted through partnering organizations.

A collaborative workshop themed “Gene Conservation of Tree Species: Banking on the Future” was held in 2016 in Chicago. It brought together forestry specialists, researchers, and public gardens professionals to discuss common interests in North American tree conservation and to explore opportunities to coordinate activities. The workshop focused on genetic conservation, pest and pathogen resistance, risk assessments, in situ conservation efforts, coordinating ex situ conservation collections, and restoration of species and ecosystems.

These activities have contributed to broader partnerships between the United States Forest Service, USDA Agricultural Research Service, and the North American Plant Conservation Initiative to safeguard trees. This initiative between American Public Gardens Association, Asociacion Mexicana de Jardines Botanicos, Botanic Gardens Conservation International, Center for Plant Conservation, and Plant Conservation Alliance non-Federal cooperators contributed collaborative conservation activities including the North American Botanic Gardens Strategy for Plant Conservation.

American Public Gardens Association and the United States Forest Service also hold a Memorandum of Understanding recently renewed in 2022 that is focused on areas of mutual interest including: collaborations in conserving at-risk species, restoration work, biological invasions detection training, environmental education, and a streamlined permit process for accessioning Forest Service lands.

Another formal agreement with the Forest Service supports APGA’s Plant Heroes environmental education program and distributes interpretive signage about high consequence pests and pathogens for public gardens to raise awareness. The Forest Service has also served as Presenting Partner of the APGA’s Annual Conference in recent years including the upcoming conference to be held June 5-8, 2023, in Fort Worth, Texas.

CaPR is a group of botanical institutions in California working to conserve the flora of the state in ex situ collections – largely in seed banks. To accomplish this goal, we need access to lands that the rare and threatened plants call home. As the USFS manages over 20 million acres in the state, it should be no surprise that many rare plants find homes under their purview. We are also more likely to know about the existence of rare plants on these federal lands, as the USFS have botanists on staff and federal projects require botanical assessments as part of NEPA requirements, meaning more is documented. An early analysis of the gaps in CaPR collections identified USFS as having occurrences of many of the taxa missing from collections. It was clear that strengthening our relationships with USFS would be necessary for CaPR to reach its goal to bank seeds from all of the rare and threatened species in the state.

To this end, the California Native Plant Society (CNPS) sought permission for CaPR from the Pacific Southwest Region of the Forest Service (Region 5) to make seed collections under a ‘blanket permit’ covering all National Forests and all taxa. This was a big ask. Permits require not only notification to forest botanists, but a biological evaluation on certain species which take a lot of field time and effort. Serving as a detailed, or temporary, regional botanist at the time, Blake Engelhardt realized that a permit wasn’t the right tool for what CaPR wanted to do. CNPS had received a special LOA for voucher collections on National Forests and that seemed to be a good tool for a similar purpose. So, Blake recommended to her supervisors, including Deputy Director of Ecosystem Management, Diana Craig, that a LOA be created for CaPR to make seed collections.

Diana presented the LOA idea to CaPR at our annual meeting in 2021. The agreement would be a formal letter covering Region 5 and allowing CaPR members to work through a special process of notification and reporting to make seed and voucher collections for five years. It acknowledges that collecting seed and the identifying vouchers from a population are conservation actions that shouldn’t be considered under the general plant collection permit process.

It took time to pull the letter and its stipulations together. Lusetta Sims stepped into the detail position of Regional Botanist, championing the cause, and USFS botanist Julie Kierstead worked with me and Aaron Sims of CNPS to pull together the details. It is no coincidence that many of the USFS personnel pushing this new tool for the partnership forward have worked closely with CaPR members in the past: with Blake having great experiences with California Botanic Garden on the Inyo National Forest and Lusetta with CNPS staff and volunteers on the Trinity-Shasta forests.

Once the letter was finished and submitted, we then needed to wait for the Regional Forester to be briefed on the agreement and sign. No one knew exactly when that would be, but in the meantime, field season had begun!

Field preparations went on as usual. CaPR members were excited by the prospect of finally making a group expedition to the far corner of the state to make collections from the extremely underrepresented area of the Modoc National Forest and Applegate Field Office-managed Bureau of Land Management (BLM) land. We developed a plan with the Modoc National Forest botanist Genevieve Harman to collect vouchers under the CNPS voucher LOA during scouting in June and wait to collect seed until if/when the CaPR LOA went through. It resulted in an odd trip where we were hoping that nothing on USFS land was ready to collect so we could avoid the sad experience of passing up perfectly good seed from rare plants.

Fortunately, the trip was well timed to catching plants in bloom rather than seed at many of our spots on the Modoc National Forest, though seed was ready to collect on the lower, drier BLM lands. But on the last day, a group had ventured to the north end of the forest to scout a promising spot with population records of at least five rare plant species nearby – and a couple of the species proved to be with ripe seed. Yet, because they had to drive so far, the group drove through the town of Alturas and had sufficient cellular signal to check email – and learn about the signing of the LOA! So, seed was collected, and the group joined the rest of the CaPR expedition group in triumph and full of happy news.

Modoc wasn’t the only National Forest CaPR members used the LOA to collect rare plant seeds from, and the reports are now rolling in detailing what the different teams were able to accomplish. We believe we are making good on the promise of the letter “to conserve USFS seed for the rarest flowering plants in California and will increase the Best Available Scientific Information about rare plants across the Region to aid management.”

As Seen on CPC’s Rare Plant Academy: Prioritizing species, populations, and regions for ex situ collecting: Threatened native U.S. oaks as a case study

Despite being essential components of many North American ecosystems, many native oaks in the U.S. are threatened with extinction in the wild. How should these trees be prioritized in ex situ conservation efforts? In this Rare Plant Academy video, a presentation from CPC’s 2019 National Meeting, Emily Beckman of The Morton Arboretum describes a conservation gap analysis of North American native oaks conducted by researchers at The Morton Arboretum, BGCI-US, and the U.S. Forest Service. This gap analysis included a survey of global ex situ efforts, allowing researchers to estimate the genetic and ecological coverage of ex situ collections for the oaks. The results from this analysis can be applied to the prioritization of species, populations, and regions when it comes to the ex situ conservation of threatened native U.S. oaks.