''Malva phoenicea'', often still known under the

synonyms A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are all ...

''Lavatera phoenicea'' and ''Navaea phoenicea'', is a large shrub of the family

Malvaceae Malvaceae, or the mallows, is a family of flowering plants estimated to contain 244 genera with 4225 known species. Well-known members of economic importance include okra, cotton, cacao and durian. There are also some genera containing familiar ...

and tribe

Malveae Malveae is a Tribe (biology), tribe of flowering plants in the Malva, mallow Family (biology), family Malvaceae, Family (biology), subfamily Malvoideae. The tribe Circumscription (taxonomy), circumscribes approximately 70 genera and 1040 species a ...

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...

to the island of

Tenerife Tenerife (; ; formerly spelled ''Teneriffe'') is the largest and most populous island of the Canary Islands. It is home to 43% of the total population of the archipelago. With a land area of and a population of 978,100 inhabitants as of Janu ...

in the

Canary Islands The Canary Islands (; es, Canarias, ), also known informally as the Canaries, are a Spanish autonomous community and archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, in Macaronesia. At their closest point to the African mainland, they are west of Morocc ...

Taxonomy

In 1805 this species was described as ''Lavatera phoenicea'' by

Étienne Pierre Ventenat Étienne Pierre Ventenat (1 March 1757 – 13 August 1808) was a French botanist born in Limoges. He was the brother of naturalist Louis Ventenat (1765–1794). While employed as director of the ecclesiastic library Sainte-Geneviève in Paris, V ...

. In 1836 Webb and Berthelot separated this plant from other ''

Lavatera ''Malva'' is a genus of herbaceous annual, biennial, and perennial plants in the family Malvaceae. It is one of several closely related genera in the family to bear the common English name mallow. The genus is widespread throughout the tempe ...

'' in a new, then

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispec ...

genus '' Navaea'', named for Alonso de Nava y Grimón, (1757-1832), founder of the botanical garden in

Puerto de la Cruz Puerto de la Cruz is a city and municipality in the northern part of the island of Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain. It was formerly known by its English translation, "Port of the Cross", although now it is known by its Spanish name in all lang ...

, Tenerife ( Jardín de Aclimatación de la Orotava). The reason for including this species in a separate genus was the presence of

nectaries Nectar is a sugar-rich liquid produced by plants in glands called nectaries or nectarines, either within the flowers with which it attracts pollinating animals, or by extrafloral nectaries, which provide a nutrient source to animal mutualists ...

in the base of each petal, which is unique in the tribe Malveae. Published studies using molecular markers (

chloroplast A chloroplast () is a type of membrane-bound organelle known as a plastid that conducts photosynthesis mostly in plant and algal cells. The photosynthetic pigment chlorophyll captures the energy from sunlight, converts it, and stores it in ...

and ITS sequences) support this separation, as

phylogenetic In biology, phylogenetics (; from Greek φυλή/ φῦλον [] "tribe, clan, race", and wikt:γενετικός, γενετικός [] "origin, source, birth") is the study of the evolutionary history and relationships among or within groups o ...

trees show ''M. phoenicea'' in a basal position in relation to the rest of ''Lavatera-Malva'' complex, which would indicate it arrived on the islands in the distant past, when the genus ''Malva'' was just beginning to differentiate.

Distribution

''M. phoenicea'' is very rare and it is threatened. It grows only in northern cliffs in the massifs of

Anaga Macizo de Anaga is a mountain range in the northeastern part of the island of Tenerife in the Canary Islands. The highest point is 1,024 m (Cruz de Taborno). It stretches from the Punta de Anaga in the northeast to Cruz del Carmen in the sou ...

and

Teno ''Technische Nothilfe'' (abbreviated as TN, T.N, T.H, Tech Nh, TeNo, TENO; ) was a German organisation. It began as a strikebreaker organisation after the First World War, but developed into a volunteer emergency response unit. During the Naz ...

, on Tenerife.

Ecology

This plant presents a clear bird

pollination syndrome Pollination syndromes are suites of flower traits that have evolved in response to natural selection imposed by different pollen vectors, which can be abiotic (wind and water) or biotic, such as birds, bees, flies, and so forth through a process c ...

, a phenomenon shared with another 12

Macaronesian Macaronesia (Portuguese: ''Macaronésia,'' Spanish: ''Macaronesia'') is a collection of four volcanic archipelagos in the North Atlantic, off the coasts of Africa and Europe. Each archipelago is made up of a number of Atlantic oceanic islands ...

endemics (genus '' Musschia'', '' Lotus'', ''

Isoplexis {{Italic title ''Isoplexis'' is a section of four species of flowering plants within the genus ''Digitalis'' in the plantain family Plantaginaceae. The species of section ''Isoplexis'' differ from other plants in the genus ''Digitalis'' in that ...

'', ''

Canarina ''Canarina'' is a genus of flowering plants within the family Campanulaceae. They are herbaceous perennial vines with bell-shaped flowers. The best known species is '' Canarina canariensis'' from the laurel forests of the Canary Islands which ...

'', ''

Echium ''Echium'' is a genus of approximately 70 species and several subspecies of flowering plant in the family Boraginaceae. Species of ''Echium'' are native to North Africa, mainland Europe to Central Asia, and the Macaronesian islands where ...

'' and ''

Scrophularia The genus ''Scrophularia'' of the family Scrophulariaceae comprises about 200 species of herbaceous flowering plants commonly known as figworts. Species of ''Scrophularia'' all share square stems, opposite leaves and open two-lipped flowers for ...

''). This bird pollination syndrome is pretty rare in these latitudes and seems to have independent origins according to phylogenies of each lineage.

Conservation

Legally, the regional government declared the species to be a "protected plant" in 1991 and the species was listed in the 2001 ''Catálogo de Especies Amenazadas de Canarias'', these law were superseded by the 2010 ''Catálogo Canario de Especies Protegidas'' law in which it was included in as a plant 'important to the

ecosystem An ecosystem (or ecological system) consists of all the organisms and the physical environment with which they interact. These biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. Energy enters the syste ...

s of the Canary Islands'. It has not been assessed by the

IUCN The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN; officially International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natu ...

. The species was first assessed according to the IUCN standards in 2000 with the status of 'endangered', in 2004 as 'vulnerable' and in 2008 as 'endangered' again. A Spanish government publication already identified it as endangered in 1984, as did a regional government publication in 1996.

References

phoenicea Flora of the Canary Islands Shrubs Taxa named by Étienne Pierre Ventenat Taxa named by Friedrich Alefeld {{Malveae-stub