Biology:Giant lobelia

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Giant lobelia and Senecio plants in Mt Kenya.

Giant lobelia is a common name for several plants in the genus Lobelia; many of these species are restricted to high altitude, alpine ecosystems. In East African highlands as many as 20 species were listed in 1934 (Bruce). A selection of species names is below. Locations where given are from 1934 (Bruce) which also provides a key to these species.

  • Lobelia aberdarica East Africa: Aberdare Mountains and Mt. Kenya, Kenya; Mt Elgon, Uganda/Kenya
  • Lobelia bambuseti East Africa: Aberdare Mountains and Mt. Kenya, Kenya
  • Lobelia bequaertii East Africa: Rwenzori Mountains
  • Lobelia deckenii East Africa: Kilimanjaro, Tanzania
  • Lobelia fenniae East Africa
  • Lobelia giberroa[1] East Africa: Rwenzori Mountains, Eastern Sudan and Aberdare Mountains, Kenya
  • Lobelia gregoriana (syn. L. deckenii subsp. keniensis, L. keniensis)
  • Lobelia lanuriensis East Africa
  • Lobelia morogoroensis[2]
  • Lobelia rhynchopetalum Abysinnia/Ethiopia
  • Lobelia stuhlmannii East Africa: Rwenzori Mountains
  • Lobelia telekii East Africa: Mt Elgon, Uganda/Kenya
  • Lobelia wollastonii East Africa: Rwenzori and Virunga

The giant lobelia span Africa, Hawaii, South America, the Himalayas, and Southeast Asia. Phylogenetic analysis strongly supports that this is a monophyletic group.[3][4] The group is thought to have originated in the Chinese region.[5] While many of the East African species have a basal rosette, representatives in Hawai'i, for example, exhibit a diversity of forms.

References

  1. Leakey, L. S. B. (1977). The Southern Kikuyu before 1903, v. III, pp. 1324–5. London and New York: Academic Press. ISBN 0-12-439903-7
  2. Knox, Eric Boyd (1993). Evolution of the Giant Senecios and Giant Lobelias in Eastern Africa. University of Michigan. p. 42. https://books.google.com/books?id=FmQeAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA42&q=morogoroensis%2BAbstract%2BKnox%2BPocs.  (http://hdl.handle.net/2027.42/103434)
  3. Antonelli, Alexandre (2007). "Higher level phylogeny and evolutionary trends in Campanulaceae subfam. Lobelioideae: Molecular signal overshadows morphology". Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 46 (1): 1–18. doi:10.1016/j.ympev.2007.06.015. PMID 18042405. 
  4. Antonelli, A. Have giant lobelias evolved several times independently? Life form shifts and historical biogeography of the cosmopolitan and highly diverse subfamily Lobelioideae (Campanulaceae) . BMC Biol 7, 82 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1186/1741-7007-7-82.
  5. Knox, Eric B.; Li, Chunjiao (2017). "The East Asian origin of the giant lobelias" (in en). American Journal of Botany 104 (6): 924–938. doi:10.3732/ajb.1700025. ISSN 0002-9122. https://bsapubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.3732/ajb.1700025. 

Other sources

  • E. A. Bruce. “The Giant Lobelias of East Africa.” Bulletin of Miscellaneous Information (Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew), vol. 1934, no. 2, 1934, pp. 61–88. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/4118226. Accessed 14 June 2024.