Identification of an endangered tree as a new record of Cordia macleodii, with an update of Cordia in West Bengal, India

Abstract

We have identified a hitherto undescribed tree, locally known as Sitapatra, which has never been mentioned in any publication of the region’s flora. However, by using morphological and molecular analyses, we identified it as Cordia macleodii (Cordiaceae). Several novel traits, never mentioned in previous taxonomic works, were observed and added to the description of the species. We suggest the conservation status of the species to be Critically Endangered, based on the criteria of a critically small population size in a narrow extent of occurrence, and the absence of flowering for 12 years in the past. Subsequently, we have updated here the distribution of Cordia L. in West Bengal, based on records from herbaria and recent publications, as well as our field observations. A distribution map for three native and an exotic species is presented. We find that although the protologue of C. macleodii indicates its type collection from central India, the herbarium record at Royal Botanic Garden, Kew mistakenly shows its type locality as West Bengal.

Keywords:

• Cordiaceae
• endangered
• rare
• tree
• India
• West Bengal

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to Dr Hemanta Sahoo, Debdulal Bhattacharjee, Haru Roy, Priyabrata Roy, Shanti Roy, Arun Ram and Amit Bera for assistance in our State-wide survey and collecting specimens of Cordia spp. described here. We are indebted to Mr Avik Saha of the Community Development Centre, Kolkata for his generous financial support to this study. We are grateful to an unknown referee for very perceptive and helpful suggestions to improve an early draft of the manuscript.