Endemic plants of the Indian peninsular savannas

Biodiversity of tropical grasslands and savannas (tropical grassy biomes; TGBs) remains poorly documented compared to tropical forests. This is in part due to the misplaced notion of TGBs being anthropogenic forest derivatives that support negligible biodiversity and endemism. For the Indian savannas, the legacy of colonial forestry has led to their misinterpretation as anthropogenic wastelands of low conservation value. One key assumption underlying the devaluation of Indian savannas against Indian forests is the presumed absence of endemic species. Through a systematic review, we test this assumption by collating data of plants endemic to the peninsular-Indian savannas and analyse their spatio-temporal discovery patterns. We found that the Indian savannas contain 206 endemic plant species, of which 43% were described in the last two decades. Spatial discovery patterns revealed two species-discovery hotspots, the eastern edge of the Western Ghats Mountains and the Eastern Ghats Mountai...

与热带森林相比，热带草原与稀树草原（热带草本生物群系；TGBs）的生物多样性记录仍十分匮乏。这在一定程度上源于一种错误认知：即热带草本生物群系（TGBs）是人为改造的森林衍生生态系统，其支撑的生物多样性与特有物种丰度均极低。就印度稀树草原而言，殖民时代林业政策留下的遗留问题，使其被错误归类为保护价值低下的人为废弃荒地。相较于印度森林，印度稀树草原被贬低的核心前提之一，便是学界默认其不存在特有物种。本研究通过系统综述，整理印度半岛稀树草原特有植物的相关数据，以此验证上述假设，并分析其发现的时空分布模式。研究结果显示，印度稀树草原共包含206种特有植物，其中43%是在过去二十年间被正式描述的。物种发现的空间分布模式表明存在两处物种发现热点区域：西高止山脉（Western Ghats Mountains）东部边缘与东高止山脉（Eastern Ghats Mountains）……