Abstract
The Cajas National Park (CNP) is located 30 km from the city of Cuenca (Ecuador), in the western Andean chain and occupies an area of almost 30,000 ha, between 3300-4450 m of altitude, and includes various ecosystems: subpáramo, herbaceous paramo and super-páramo, which include grasslands (dominant in CNP), wetlands, Polylepis sp. pl. and scrubs; above 4200 m, bush communities adapted to extreme edaphoclimatic conditions dominate. For the elaboration of the catalogue of the vascular flora of the CNP, we compiled, refined and analysed the information available in the herbaria of the University of Azuay (Cuenca, Ecuador) (HA), Missouri Botanical Garden (MO), Pontificia Universidad Católica de Ecuador (QCA) and Tropicos® database, with records of altitudes above 3300 m asl and our collections in the years 2012-2019. 666 species are documented, belonging to 264 genera and 89 botanical families; we describe their biological form (biotype), habitat, distribution ‒with special attention to endemic and non-native species‒ and degree of threat. Finally, the data for each of these criteria are jointly analysed and compared with other Andean mountain ranges. Dichondra macrocalyx Meisn. and Piptochaetium tovarii Sánchez Vega are reported for the first time in Ecuador.
Highlights
The term ‘páramo’ in the context of the Andes has its origins in the transposition by Cuatrecasas (1958) of a common Spanish term for the desolate high-mountain landscapes of the Andes
South American páramos are located between latitudes 11°N and 8°S, from Costa Rica to northern Peru (Luteyn & Balslev, 1992; Luteyn, 1999; Sklenář & Jørgensen, 1999; Hofstede, 2003; Sklenář et al, 2005; Llambí et al, 2014), in other cases the northern limit is located in Venezuela; other authors reject this more restricted definition and extend the concept of páramo to the whole of the tropical alpine belt (Smith & Young, 1987; Hofstede, 2003; Pulgar et al, 2010), where there are numerous morphological and structural convergences
In regard to generic richness, 17 families are represented by ≥ 4 genera, of which the most numerous are Asteraceae (44, almost 17% of the total), followed by Poaceae (26), Rosaceae, Cyperaceae and Orchidaceae (9 each), Brassicaceae (8), Caryophyllaceae and Apiaceae (7 each), Solanaceae (6), Pteridaceae, Polypodiaceae, Fabaceae, Ericaceae and Boraginaceae (5 each), Plantaginaceae, Gentianaceae, Rubiaceae (4 each); the rest are below this limit
Summary
The term ‘páramo’ in the context of the Andes has its origins in the transposition by Cuatrecasas (1958) of a common Spanish term for the desolate high-mountain landscapes of the Andes. The lower limit of the páramo has no fixed altitude and its location depends on climate factors, continental slopes, orientation of the valleys and the human activities that have taken place over time (Beltrán et al, 2009; White, 2013); the upper limit is subject to local conditions. Notwithstanding these explanations, the term is polysemic for a variety of reasons, including the difficulty in defining it (Hofstede, 2003)
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