Gomez et al. 2026 (Article) Mexico, endemic species

Areas of endemism of Mexican Bromeliaceae

Author(s):—I.N. Gomez-Escamilla, A. Espejo-Serna, T. Escalante & C. Ballesteros-Barrera

Publication:—Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society boag085: 1–17 (Online). (2026) — DOI

Abstract:—Mexican bromeliads include 460 species, 75% of which are geographically restricted to the country; however, their distributional patterns have not been extensively studied. Areas of Endemism (AoE) are distributional patterns based on spatial overlapping, and their understanding allows us to select suitable areas to be protected. Mexico was chosen as the study area, to obtain the AoEs of bromeliads restricted to the country. Two methods were used: Endemicity Analysis (EA) and Parsimony Analysis of Endemicity (PAE). We used four matrixes with 5958 records including 293 species overlapped to four grid sizes (2?, 1?, 0.75?, and 0.5? latitude-longitude) and 70 sub-basins. With the EA, for each cell size we obtained four, six, three, and four consensus areas (AoEC) supported by 49, 29, 18, and 14 species, respectively. The areas obtained were in the Balsas Basin, the Transmexican Volcanic Belt, and the Sierra Madre del Sur biogeographic provinces. The PAE generated a cladogram in which the Costa Chica de Guerrero and the Medio Balsas-Alto Balsas-Tepalcatepec sub-basins were grouped by five endemic species. The results obtained with both methods highlight the importance of the Balsas Basin province and within it the Tehuac?n-Cuicatl?n Protected Natural Area (PNA) as a core location for the conservation of Mexican bromeliads. Although presence of bromeliads have been previously considered to indicate core[nucleo] zones in the Tehuac?n-Cuicatl?n PNA, here we recognize six more species belonging to the genera Hechtia and Tillandsia, which are important to generate the proposal of core zones for this reserve.

Keywords:—Balsas Basin, biogeographic regionalization, conservation priorities, endemic species, endemicity index, value of endemicity, monocots, parsimony, Tehuacán-Cuicatlán