Abstract
Mexico is floristically the fourth most species-rich country in the world, and Asteraceae is the most diverse vascular plant family in this country. The species exhibits a wide range of growth forms, but the tree-like habit, appropriately named daisy trees, is heavily underestimated, even though slightly different tree definitions are handled. Very little is known about their precise species number or conservation status in Mexico, so we update here the list of known Mexican daisy tree species, summarize their very diverse uses, present a general panorama of their present and future distribution, and discuss their conservation status. A bibliographic review and herbarium study were carried out, carefully curated taxonomical ocurrence maps were prepared for each species, and a climatic suitability modelling approach was used to characterise the spatial patterns of Mexican Asteraceae trees. With 149 daisy tree species, the country ranks second at a global level; within the country, their greatest diversity is found in central and western Mexico. A decrease in diversity is estimated in areas that currently host the highest species richness, whereas the hotspot regions are estimated to show an increase in species diversity, so climate change is not a threat to all Mexican daisy tree species.
Highlights
With more than 23,000 vascular plant species, Mexico is floristically the fourth most species-rich country in the world, after Brazil, China, and Colombia [1,2]; 11,600 of the Mexican plant species are endemic [1]
The results show that the mountain regions of Guerrero and Oaxaca belonging to the Sierra Madre del Sur (SMS) and the Sierra Norte de Oaxaca (SNO), the Tacaná Volcano (TV) in Chiapas on the border with Guatemala, the south of the State of future, there will be a decrease in the Sierra Madre Occidental, Sierra Madre Oriental, and
The difference between the two models indicates that there will be a small increase in the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt, Northern Altiplano (Chihuahuan desert) and Cape provinces, thereby maintaining the trend observed in the other models: a decrease in the sites that currently host the highest species richness, as well as an increase or no change in areas were the actual daisy tree diversity is considerable, such as the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt, Balsas Depression, Sierra Madre del Sur, Pacific coast, and Soconusco
Summary
With more than 23,000 vascular plant species, Mexico is floristically the fourth most species-rich country in the world, after Brazil, China, and Colombia [1,2]; 11,600 of the Mexican plant species are endemic [1]. Even though at least some of these discrepancies might be due to different tree definitions applied, we consider that a considerable cause is what we might call “Asteraceae tree blindness”; most people, including botanists, picture representatives of this family as annual herbs or short-lived perennials, contrasting with the surprisingly high number of woody species it contains. These trees with their beautiful and striking inflorescences are appropriately called daisy trees (Figure 1). Some species reported as arborescent both in the literature and on the labels of herbarium specimens were excluded from the list because they have been synonimized, e.g., Roldana cordovensis
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