National Red Data Books
Atlas y Libro Rojo de la Flora Vascular Amenazada de España.
Taxones Prioritarios. A. Bañares, G. Blanca, J. Güemes, J.C.
Moreno & S. Ortiz, eds. 2003. Pp. 1067. Dirección General de Conservación
de la Naturaleza, Ministerio de Medio Ambiente. Madrid. [In Spanish.] (Covers
478 taxa, mainly those with EX, EW, CR and EN categories in the 2000 Red List
(below), but not the 700 plants listed as VU.) Plant
Talk review by Professor V.H. Heywood. 2nd edition with corrections and
some new data, published 2005, pp. 1069.
Lista Roja de Flora Vascular Española (Red List of Spanish Vascular
Flora). I. Aizpuru et al. 2000. Pp. 39. Conservación Vegetal, número
especial 6, Madrid. [In Spanish, with English summary.] (List of 1414 threatened
plants for Spain, including Balearic and Canary Islands, to post-1994 IUCN
categories for degree of threat.)
Libro Rojo de la flora canaria contenida en la Directiva Hábitats
europea. E. Beltrán Tejera, W. Wildpret de la Torre, M.C. León
Arencibia, A. García Gallo & J. Reyes Hernández. 1999. 694
pp. Ministerio de Medio Ambiente. La Laguna. (Deals only with EU Habitats
Directive species)
Not a Red Data Book but vitally important for plant conservation is the following
atlas of invasive plants:
Atlas de las Plantas Alóctonas Invasoras en España.
M. Sanz Elorza, E.D. Dana Sánchez & E. Sobrino Vesperinas, eds.
2004, distributed 2005. Pp. 378. Dirección General de Conservación
de la Naturaleza, Ministerio de Medio Ambiente. Madrid. [In Spanish.] (Includes
123 invasive taxa, of the 937 alien plants recorded in Spain so far. Every
taxon is covered by a data sheet. Preliminary and final chapters update information
about the effects of alien plants in natural and semi-natural plant communities.)
Floras
Flora of Macaronesia. Check list of vascular plants.
4th Ed. A. Hansen & P. Sunding. 1993. Sommerfeldia 17. Oslo, Norway.
Flores silvestres de las Islas Canarias. D. & Z. Bramwell. 1990.
376 pp. Ed. Rueda. Madrid. English Edition (revised): Wild Flowers of the
Canary Islands. 2nd ed. David Bramwell & Zoë Bramwell. Editorial
Rueda, Sl. Pp. 570. 2001. €33.06. Available from Editorial Rueda, Porto
Cristo 13, 28924 Alcorcón, Madrid, Spain (fax +34-91-610-2855, e-mail
ed_rueda@infornet.es). (Reviewed in
Plant Talk 29: 41)
Vegetation
In the western and central islands extensive woods; in the eastern islands mostly xerophytic scrub, reflecting the more arid climate of North Africa. Bramwell (1974) lists 6 vegetation types, which show striking altitudinal zonation: semi-desert succulent scrub (0-700 m); juniper scrub (south slopes, 400-600 m); tree heath and evergreen forest, the former of Erica arborea, the latter of Lauraceae, forming the famous and species-rich laurel forests, of which only small areas remain (400-1300 m); savanna of Pinus canariensis (800-1900 m); montane scrub (1900-2500 m); and subalpine scrub (only on Pico de Teide, Tenerife, c. 2600 m). In Gran Canaria, the laurel forest is now less than 1% of its original extent; in Tenerife about 10%. (Paragraph reproduced with permission from Davis, S.D. et al. (1986). Plants in Danger: What do we know? IUCN, Gland, Switzerland).
Plant Conservation Programmes
Funded by the Ministry of Environment and managed by the
Dirección General de Conservación de la Naturaleza, the Threatened
Flora Atlas project (2000–3) involved 29 teams and more than 200 botanists
to create a database of threatened Spanish flora, to census the 478 most endangered
species and to monitor demographic parameters of 40 selected plants. A new
Spanish Red Data Book was published in 2004 (see above), including a preliminary
survey of the alien taxa threatening the native flora and a detailed and ordered
selection of important areas for the conservation of the Spanish flora at
risk. The project will now cover the 700 Vulnerable taxa excluded in this
first phase.
The
National Catalogue of Threatened Species, which uses similar but not identical
categories to IUCN, lists 132 plant species. Legal plans of action for the
recovery of the species are required for all species in the Catalogue, but
only 13 have been officially approved so far.
Other than national parks, the Red List programme (above) and participation
in international agreements, most conservation actions in Spain are carried
out by the 17 Autonomous Communities.
The regional government of the Canary Islands (Viceconsejeria de Medio Ambiente)
prepares lists of species to be included in the Regional and National Catalogue
of Endangered Taxa (containing 64 Canarian endemic plants so far, also included
in the National Catalogue) and coordinates the drafting and implementation
of recovery plans. The Jardín Botánico Viera y Clavijo, Las
Palmas, provides a gene bank of Canarian threatened plants and works on the
conservation biology of Canarian plants. The Organismo Autónomo de
Parques Nacionales implements Special Recovery Plans through the Master Plans
of the Canary Island's National Parks and has established the Jardín
Botánico del Parque Nacional del Teide to facilitate active conservation
programmes for endangered Canarian plants (see Planta Europa Proceedings,
1998 conference, pp. 198-204).
Key Institutions
National
Ministerio de Medio Ambiente, Dirección
General de Conservación de la Naturaleza, Subdirección General
de Conservación de la Biodiversidad, Gran Vía San Francisco,
4, E-28005 Madrid.
NGOs
Sociedad Española de
Biología de la Conservación de Plantas. (Chair: Jaime Güemes),
Jardí Botànic de la Universitat de València, Quart, 80,
E-46008 Valencia, Spain. (Created in 2003 as a new NGO for plant conservation
in Spain, from the former IUCN Commission of Flora, of the Spanish Committee
for IUCN).
ARBA (Association for the Auctoctonous
Forest Recovery). Albergue Juvenil “Richard Schirrmann”, Casa de
Campo s/n. E-28011 Madrid.
Fundacion Enrique Montoliu, Plaza Mariano
Benlliure 5-29, E-46002 Valencia. (Private foundation established in 1996
in Valencia that supports nature conservation).
Other useful information
The website of the Spanish nature and conservation magazine
Quercus
The website of IUCN’s Spanish Plant Commision magazine Conservación
Vegetal
References cited
Machado, A. (1998). Biodiversidad. Un paseo por el concepto y las Islas Canarias. Ed. Cabildo Insular de Tenerife.
Acknowledgement
Prepared November 2005, based on material originally on the parallel page for Spain which had been extended and updated regularly by Juan Carlos Moreno.
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