''Portulaca molokiniensis'', known also as 'ihi, is a succulent plant endemic to

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only stat ...

. This

plant Plants are predominantly photosynthetic eukaryotes of the kingdom Plantae. Historically, the plant kingdom encompassed all living things that were not animals, and included algae and fungi; however, all current definitions of Plantae exclud ...

is federally listed as an

endangered An endangered species is a species that is very likely to become extinct in the near future, either worldwide or in a particular political jurisdiction. Endangered species may be at risk due to factors such as habitat loss, poaching and inva ...

species. It has small

yellow Yellow is the color between green and orange on the spectrum of light. It is evoked by light with a dominant wavelength of roughly 575585 nm. It is a primary color in subtractive color systems, used in painting or color printing. In the R ...

flower A flower, sometimes known as a bloom or blossom, is the reproductive structure found in flowering plants (plants of the division Angiospermae). The biological function of a flower is to facilitate reproduction, usually by providing a mechani ...

s and when grown from seed may produce a

caudex A caudex (plural: caudices) of a plant is a stem, but the term is also used to mean a rootstock and particularly a basal stem structure from which new growth arises.pages 456 and 695 In the strict sense of the term, meaning a stem, "caudex" is m ...

. This plant is easy to propagate. This rare species of ''

Portulaca ''Portulaca'' (, is the type genus of the flowering plant family Portulacaceae, with over 100 species, found in the tropics and warm temperate regions. They are known as the purslanes. Common purslane (''Portulaca oleracea'') is widely consume ...

'' is restricted to a few coastal sites on

Molokini Molokini is a crescent-shaped, partially submerged volcanic crater which forms a small, uninhabited islet located in ʻAlalākeiki Channel between the islands of Maui and Kahoolawe, within Maui County in Hawaii. It is the remains of one of the s ...

Island (

Maui The island of Maui (; Hawaiian: ) is the second-largest of the islands of the state of Hawaii at 727.2 square miles (1,883 km2) and is the 17th largest island in the United States. Maui is the largest of Maui County's four islands, which ...

), Puʻukoaʻe Islet and Kamōhio Bay,

Kahoʻolawe Kahoolawe (Hawaiian: ), anglicized as Kahoolawe (), is the smallest of the eight main volcano, volcanic islands in the Hawaiian Islands. Kahoolawe is located about southwest of Maui and also southeast of Lanai, Lānaʻi, and it is long by wide ...

. It is known to grow in volcanic tuff,

detritus In biology, detritus () is dead particulate organic material, as distinguished from dissolved organic material. Detritus typically includes the bodies or fragments of bodies of dead organisms, and fecal material. Detritus typically hosts commun ...

at base of sea cliff and on steep rocky slopes from about 30 to about 375 feet. ''Portulaca molokiniensis'' is a rare endemic to the Hawaiian islands where it known to grow in loose volcanic

scree Scree is a collection of broken rock fragments at the base of a cliff or other steep rocky mass that has accumulated through periodic rockfall. Landforms associated with these materials are often called talus deposits. Talus deposits typically ha ...

on steep slopes and in sand near the seaside on the arid islets of Molokini and Pu'ukoa'e and at Kanhio Bay on Kaho'olawe off the west coast of Maui. Though many think of the Hawaiian islands as lush and moist, the collection sites on these islands are on the leeward, rainshadow side and are extremely dry. Though this plant was first collected by Charles N. Forbes on Molokini in February 1913, it was identified as ''

Portulaca lutea ''Portulaca lutea'', the native yellow purslane, is a species of ''Portulaca'' that is indigenous to all of the main islands of Hawaii except for Kaua'i and is widespread throughout the Pacific Islands. Ecology ''Portulaca lutea'' is very muc ...

'', a plant more widely distributed throughout the Pacific islands. It was collected once again as Portulaca lutea in the 1920s and then not documented again until collections made in the late 1970s and early 1980s where the distinctiveness of the plant was noted and it was officially described as a new species by Hawaii forester Bob Hobdy in 1987.

References

External links

{{Taxonbar, from=Q17252513 Endemic flora of Hawaii molokiniensis Flora without expected TNC conservation status