Morphological and molecular data support recognition of Spergularia quartzicola (Caryophyllaceae) as a new species endemic to South Africa

Abstract

A new species, Spergularia quartzicola, is described from the quartz outcrops of Knersvlakte (Namaqualand, South Africa). It was sometimes confused with S. media because of perennial habit and white flowers, but the new species differs by the subshrubby, strongly woody at base, habit (vs. herbaceous, suffruticose at the base); the leaves with a long mucro and stipules narrowly triangular and acuminate (vs. leaves with minute or absent mucro, and stipules broadly triangular and not acuminate); the flowers with styles fused in a long column (vs. styles entirely free), and the seeds with deeply and irregularly lacerate wing (vs. wing entire or slightly eroded). This combination of characters is unique among the known South African relatives. Our trnL-trnF and 5.8-ITS2 phylogenetic trees place S. quartzicola together with the South African S. glandulosa and S. namaquensis in an unresolved clade, which is far from the group of S. media. Furthermore, the outstanding morphological, ecological and chorological divergence exhibited by S. quartzicola support its recognition at species rank. According to the data presented here, S. quartzicola should be considered an edaphic specialist, which might have arisen following ecological diversification on Knersvlakte quartz outcrops, as it occurred in other taxa endemic to that territory.

Keywords:

• Cape flora
• endemics
• Namaqualand
• quartz patches
• Sperguleae
• taxonomy
• trnL-trnF phylogenetic trees
• 5.8-ITS2 phylogenetic trees

Acknowledgements

We thank the curators and staff of the herbaria cited in the text. Two anonymous reviewers made interesting comments that improved the final version of the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was partly supported by H2020 Research and Innovation Staff Exchange (RISE) Programme of the European Commission, project num. 645636: “Insect-plant relationships: insights into biodiversity and new applications” (FlyHigh), and the grants ACIE 16–01, ACIE 17–01 and ACIE 18–03 from the University of Alicante. Herbarium specimens were collected under permission provided by CapeNature of Western Cape Province (collecting and export permits no. AAA005-00080-0028, AAA008-00031-0028, 0027-AAA008-00699, and 0028-AAA008-00203). L. Mucina acknowledges the logistic support of the Iluka Chair at the Murdoch University, Perth, Australia.