Go, Rusea

Kiew, Ruth

Universiti Putra Malaysia Institutional Repository

CONSERVATION OF BIODIVERSITY OFLIMESTONE FLORA OF MALAYSIAUPM Research Report 1998: Volume 2...................... IIiiii.iIiI ..G. Rusea and R. KiewFaculty of Science and Environmental StudiesUniversiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 UPM, Serdang, Selangor,MalaysiaKeywords: conservation, biodiversity, limestoneflora, taxonomy.IntroductionMalaysian limestone flora is poorly known botanically espe-cially in Sabah and Sarawak. The increasing developmentand quarrying activities on limestone hills may deprive us toproceed our inventory of flora diversity in these areas. There-fore, it is our greatest concern to at least obtain a completelist of hills mapped and co-ordinated in Sabah and Sarawak.On the basis of present data available from the herbariumspecimens at Forest Research Centre, Sandakan and Kuch-ing, a checklist of plant species collected together with theirlocalities from the two states will be produced. Explorationof limestone localities that are unknown and are poorlyknown botanically will continue and assessment for theirconservation status will follows. It is hoped from the overallfield collections and herbarium specimens data assessmentthat limestone hills of scientific importance could be identi-fied so that we can draw up a management plan for theirlong-term protection and also to build up living collections oforchids and other commercially important species from lime-stone areas.Materials and MethodsField visits and collections will be carried out to these lime-stone areas. Collections will be of living collections and her-barium specimens. All collections will be identified and du-plicates of herbarium specimens will be distributed to her-baria especially, Kepong (KEP), Kew (K), Leiden (L), San-dakan (SAN) and Sarawak (SAR) for further rectification ofspecimen identity and safe keeping for future study. The liv-ing collections especially orchids will be planted in arbore-tum or green houses both in Sandakan and Kuching.Results and DiscussionAs of December 1998, almost half of the limestone localitieswere visited in Sabah and four in Peninsular Malaysia andfrom these visits, 400 herbarium collections were made inSabah and 50 from Peninsular Malaysia. The visits and col-lections has contributed to the discovery of 10 new species of232Begonia, 2 new species of Peperomia and one new variety ofCodiaeum (Euphorbiaceae) and several new records for'Sabah (Kiew, 1998a). The limestone localities in Sabah havebeen successfully mapped (Kiew and van 'Welzen, 1998).This study has revealed that there were many limestone lo-calities has never been explored botanically and so the gaz-etteer provides the basis for the exploration program espe-cially to make botanical collection to localities not previouslyvisited. The database for checklist of limestone flora ofSabah and Sarawak continues with herbarium specimensbeing deposited at Forest Research Centre Sanadakan andKuching. In Sarawak collections of rare, endangered andcommercially valuable orchids from the limestone localitieshas started long before the conception of this collaborationand their living collections will soon be moving to a new or-chid house constructed with the funds we extended to themearly 1998. A checklist of orchids from limestone areas inSarawak based on herbarium collections has been preparedand manuscript of the paper is in the fmal form and will bepublished soon. The survey of floristic diversity and degreeof endemism in Bukit Bauk, Terengganu and CameronHighlands has contributed to one master's graduate and twopublications (Tam et al. 1998; Teo, et al. 1998).ConclusionsPreliminary analysis of the data on the Flora of Sabah has re-vealed two interesting and hitherto unknown phyto-geographical regions (Kiew, 1998b) namely that species onlimestone in the Southeast Sabah shows strong links with thePhilippine flora, and most unexpectedly that the limestoneflora of Sabah is distinct from that of Sarawak. This latterneed to be confirmed as the limestone closest to Sarawak hasyet to be explored.ReferencesKiew, R. 1998a. Niche partitioning in limestone Begonias in Sabah, •Borneo, including new species. Gard. Bull. Sing. 50(2): (inpress).Kiew, R. 1998b. Towards a limestone flora of Sabah, Borneo. In:K.M. Wong (ed.) Proceedings of B.C. Stone Symposium, Uni-versiti Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, July, 1998.Kiew, R. and van Welzen, P. 1998. Codiaeum variegatum var caver-nicola var. nov. (Euphorbiaceae), the second Codiaeum fromBorneo.Tam, S.M., Qu~, ~.C., Saw, L.G., Chua, L., Saleh, K. and Anthony,S. 199~. Floristic survey of Bukit Bauk, Terengganu, PeninsularMalaysia, Malaysian Applied Biology. 27 (supplement).Teo, L.L., Kiew, R. and Anthonysamy, S. 1998. Hybrid Begoniafrom Cameron Highlands. Malaysian Applied Biology.27(suppl):83-86.Supported by IRPA Grant OS"()2-04-OO38

Conservation of biodiversity of limestone flora of Malaysia

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Conservation of biodiversity of limestone flora of Malaysia

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