Journal of
Threatened Taxa | www.threatenedtaxa.org | 26 September 2018 | 10(10):
12439–12441
Notes on Jasminum
andamanicum N.P. Balakr. & N.G. Nair (Oleaceae) from Andaman &
Nicobar Islands, India
P. Murugan 1
& K. Karthigeyan
2
1 Botanical Survey of India, Southern
Regional Centre, TNAU Campus, Lawley Road Post,
Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu 641003, India
2 Botanical Survey of India, Central
National Herbarium, Botanic Garden P.O., Howrah, West Bengal 711103, India
1 murulax@gmail.com, 2 karthigeyan.murthy@gmail.com
(corresponding author)
doi: https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.4304.10.10.12439-12441
Editor: N.P. Balakrishnan, Coimbatore, Tamil
Nadu, India. Date of publication: 26 September 2018 (online &
print)
Manuscript details: Ms
# 4304 | Received 30 May 2018 | Final received 04 September 2018 | Finally
accepted 09 September 2018
Citation: Murugan, P. & K. Karthigeyan (2018). Notes on Jasminum andamanicum
N.P. Balakr. & N.G. Nair (Oleaceae) from Andaman & Nicobar Islands, India. Journal
of Threatened Taxa 10(10): 12439–12441; http://doi.org/10.11609/jott.4304.10.10.12439-12441
Copyright: © Murugan & Karthigeyan 2018. Creative Commons
Attribution 4.0 International License. JoTT
allows unrestricted use of this article in any medium, reproduction and
distribution by providing adequate credit to the authors and the source of
publication.
Funding: Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate
Change (MoEF & CC) and Botanical Survey of India (BSI).
Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.
Acknowledgements: Authors are thankful to Dr. Paramjit Singh, Director,
Botanical Survey of India, Kolkata, for facilities and Dr.
P.V. Prasanna, Scientist ‘F’ & HoO, Central National Herbarium, Botanical Survey of India,
Howrah, for his encouragement and facilities.
The authors also thank Dr. Avishek
Bhattacharjee, Central National Herbarium for his
help in preparing the distribution map for threat assessment; PM is also
grateful to Dr. C. Murugan,
Scientist-D & HoO, BSI, SRC, Coimbatore for his
encouragement and facilities and the Ministry of Environment, Forest and
Climate Change, Govt. India, New Delhi, for the financial support under Flora
of India project.
Jasminum L., comprising of ca. 200 species, is distributed in tropical to
temperate regions of the Old World (Mabberley
2017). This genus is found commonly in
deciduous and evergreen forests as climbing shrubs with flowers generally in
white, pink or yellow colours and sweet-scented.
Clarke
(1882) in Hooker’s ”The Flora of British India” reported 43 species and 15
infra-specific taxa of Jasminum from
India, Burma (now Myanmar), Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Malacca, Tibet, Nepal and Malaya
Peninsula. Srivastava
(1987) reported 10 genera, 87 species and 15 infra-specific taxa belonging to
the family Oleaceae, in India including the Himalaya,
the northeast, peninsular regions, and Andaman & Nicobar Islands. Among these, 27 are endemic taxa. A total of 17 taxa of Jasminum
are listed under various threat categories (Srivastava
& Kapoor 1987).
In
India, Jasminum is represented by 37 species
and 15 infra-specific taxa (Green 2003; Gastmans
& Balachandran 2006), of which 12 species are
considered endemic to India (Ahmedullah & Nayar 1986; Srivastava & Kapoor 1987; Singh et al. 2015). In Andaman & Nicobar Islands, so far 12
species are known to occur, namely, J. acuminatissimum,
J. andamanicum, J. angustifolium,
J. arborescens, J. attenuatum,
J. auriculatum, J. caudatum,
J. elongatum, J. flexile, J. multiflorum,
J. ritchiei, and J. syringifolium
(Green 2003; Pandey & Diwakar
2008), of which only one species, J. andamanicum
is endemic to the Andaman group of Islands.
Balakrishanan & Nair (1981) described J. andamanicum
based on the specimens collected from southern Andaman by Dr.
King’s collector. Later, Balakrishanan & Nair (1983) described a new species, J.
unifoliolatum based on their collections from
Saddle Peak in northern Andaman. This
species was distinguished from J. caudatum by
the leaves being mostly unifoliolate, broader,
thick-coriaceous, penninerved; panicles densely
white-hairy; cymes lax-flowered and corolla tube and lobes being short. Srivastava (1991)
proposed a new name, J. balakrishnanii for J.
unifoliolatum as the name was preoccupied and
hence an illegitimate later homonym.
Later, Green (2003) synonymized the name J. balakrishnanii
and treated it as conspecific to J. andamanicum
in his synopsis of the Oleaceae from the Indian
subcontinent
While
studying some of the old collections of Jasminum
housed at CAL, specimens collected by Dr. King’s
collector during 1891 and 1892 from southern Andaman were found as
unidentified. On studying their
morphological characters, and on consultation with the type specimens and
relevant literature, they were identified as Jasminum
andamanicum.
It is interesting to note that these collections were made three years
before the holotype collection. Also, one of the specimens was collected from
a different locality, from where this species has never been reported earlier,
until now. The present article provides
a detailed description of the species, image of the one of the old specimens
collected prior to the type collection, and a distribution map (Fig. 1) of this
rare, endemic species. The species is
evaluated as per the recent IUCN Red List Category and Criteria version 3.1
(IUCN 2018).
Jasminum andamanicum N.P. Balakr.
& N.G. Nair (Image 1)
Bull. Bot. Surv.
India 21: 215, fig. 1-3. 1979 (publ.
1981); S.K. Srivast. &
S.L. Kapoor in J. Econ. Taxon. Bot. 9(1): 175.
1987; Mathew, S.P. & S. Abraham in J. Bombay Nat. Hist. Soc. 91: 162. 1994; P.S. Green, Kew Bull. 58(1): 282. 2003;
R.P. Pandey & P.G. Diwakar
in J. Econ. Taxon. Bot. 32(2): 439. 2008. Jasminum
unifoliolatum N.P. Balakr.
& N.G. Nair in Bull. Bot. Surv.
India 24: 33. 1982, non Gillespie
1930; S.K. Srivast. & S.L. Kapoor in J. Econ. Taxon. Bot. 9(1): 175. 1987. Jasminum balakrishnanii
S.K. Srivast. in Bull. Bot. Surv. India 32: 174. 1990 (publ.
1992), nom. nov.
Type:
India, Andaman & Nicobar Islands, southern Andaman: North Bay, hill jungle,
5.1.1894, King’s collector s.n. (holotype
CAL0000017761!; isotypes
CAL0000017743!, CAL0000017744!, CAL0000017745!
Vine or scandent shrub; branchlets
slender or terete, glabrous,
young parts sparsely puberulous.
Leaves opposite, 3-foliolate, sometimes lateral leaflets wanting or caducous; leaflets ovate or elliptic, 4–8 × 2.5–5 cm,
obtuse or acute at base, entire at margins, acute to acuminate at apex,
coriaceous, glabrous; lateral veins 5–8 pairs,
ascending and interarching away from margin; petioles
2–2.8 cm long, geniculate, slender, leaf base bending or somewhat swelling; petiolules, 1cm long, terete. Inflorescences terminal or sometimes axillary
at upper leaves, paniculate cymes, 4–16 cm long,
densely white-hairy; peduncles 4–14 cm long, terete,
sparsely white-hairy; bracts filiform or linear, 3–8
mm long, white-hairy. Flowers
pentamerous, sessile or subsessile;
central flower sessile, densely white-hairy and pedicels of lateral flowers, terete, 5–15 mm long, densely white-hairy. Calyx tube 1–2 mm long, densely
white-hairy, 4 or 5-lobed; lobes ovate or triangular, 2–3 mm long, lower
densely white-hairy and upper glabrous. Corolla milky white with pleasant smell;
tube, 2–2.5 cm long; lobes 5, ovate, 4–6 mm long, acute at apex. Stamens 2
bright lemon yellow; filaments sessile or subsessile;
anthers oblong, 3–4.1 mm long, acute at apex, dithecous,
longitudinally dehiscing. Ovary 2-loculed; ovules 2, less than 1.5mm long; style linear or filiform, 15–20 mm long; stigma bilobed,
ca. 1mm long, glabrous. Drupes ellipsoid or oblongoid, 1–1.5 mm long, glabrous.
Flowering:
December–February; Fruiting: March–April.
Distribution: Endemic to Andaman group of
Islands.
Additional
specimens examined: CAL0000029896!, 5.xii.1891, India, Andaman & Nicobar
Islands: Southern Andaman, North Bay, hill jungle, King’s Collector s.n. ;
5.xii.1892,
South Andaman, North Bay, hill jungle, King’s Collector s.n.
(CAL!); 20.xii.1892, Dhanikhari, King’s Collector s.n. (CAL!); CAL0000017760!,
17.xii.1915, Middle Andaman: Long Island, C.E. Parkinson 787, North Andaman
Island: (holotype CAL0000017747!; isotypes
PBL!), 4766, Saddle Peak, 1.xii.1976, 400–700 m, N.P. Balakrishnan
& N.G. Nair.
Conservation status
This species was first collected by King’s collector in 1891 from North Bay area in southern
Andaman. Later, C.E. Parkinson collected
this species from Middle Andamans. The recent collection of this species dates
back to 1976 by Balakrishnan & Nair from Saddle Peak
of North Andaman Island. Mathew &
Abraham (1994) rediscovered and reported it from Shoal Bay of Mount Harriet in
South Andaman Island. There was no
report on the occurrence of this species thereafter.
Jasminum andamanicum is reported so far only from four
locations in Andaman Islands, India. The
extent of occurrence (EOO, Criterion B1) of the species is calculated as ca.
1,139km2 and the area of occupancy (AOO, Criterion B2) of the
species is calculated as ca. 16km2 (severely fragmented and with a suspected
decline of mature individuals, being sparsely distributed). The AOO is measured against the grid size of
4km2 for each of the four locations.
Other
than Saddle Peak National Park in North Andaman Island, the habitat quality of
other places of collection of this species has degraded to a large extent as
they are under extreme pressure from human interference, as they do not fall
under any protected area. The quality of
habitat in these places also face serious threat due to developmental activities
like the construction of a dam in Dhanikhari, tourism
activities, and grazing by herbivorous animals.
The
species is assessed here as Endangered [B1ab(iii,iv)+2ab(iii,iv)] as per the
IUCN Red List of Threatened Species guidelines version 3.1.
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